Gordon Banks: I hope that the Scottish Executive in Holyrood are listening to our commitment in this regard. I note that eco-towns will provide low running cost properties and good access to public transport, but does my hon. Friend agree that we need to regenerate our towns and cities at the same time so that one does not succeed at the expense of the other?

Andy Burnham: With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement on casino policy.
	Today I am laying a draft order identifying 16 local authorities, which will be authorised to license the eight large and eight small casinos permitted by the Gambling Act 2005. I do not intend to authorise a regional casino.
	My right hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Tessa Jowell) established the casino advisory panel to advise on the location of the 17 new casinos permitted by the Act. The panel considered applications from 68 local authorities and made its recommendations after detailed consideration.
	Before I make further progress, the House will want to know that, since we last discussed those matters, the chair of the independent panel, Professor Stephen Crow, has passed away. I hope that the whole House will join me in sending our condolences to his family and paying tribute to the integrity and dedication that he brought to his role.
	Last March, an order incorporating the panel's recommendations was defeated in another place. Since then, the Government have reflected on the range of views expressed in both Houses and beyond. There was a consensus that the eight large and eight small casino licences should be awarded to the 16 licensing authorities identified by the casino advisory panel. That view was expressed by Opposition Front Benchers and their lordships in their message to this House, calling for the 16 to be incorporated in a fresh order.
	Following last year's local elections, my right hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (James Purnell) invited all 16 councils to state whether it remained their wish to license a new casino. All 16 have requested inclusion in the new order.
	However, there was and is no consensus on a regional casino. There are important differences between the regional casino on the one hand and the large and small casinos on the other. The regional casino would have been allowed up to 1,250 unlimited stake and prize gaming machines—something not previously seen in the United Kingdom. The large and small casinos would be allowed to offer 150 and 80 category B1 gaming machines respectively, with a maximum £2 stake and £4,000 prize. B1 machines are already in use in Britain today.
	There are two principal and independent reasons for my decision not to proceed with a regional casino. First, concerns were expressed in both Houses about the potential negative impact of a regional casino operating on the proposed scale. I have not seen anything to suggest that the will of Parliament has changed. Secondly, I have considered the evidence, both old and new, on the impact of regional casinos. This evidence, including the scoping study by Lancaster university, which I am laying in the House today, points towards the uncertainty of the risks involved and does not dispel those anxieties.
	The Gambling Commission's prevalence study, published in September, highlights the fact that problem gambling, although small, remains persistent. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government has concluded that regional casinos are likely to have no, or only marginal net benefits compared with other means of economic and social regeneration. In the light of that and the evidence about the uncertain levels of risk, I do not intend to authorise a regional casino.
	I know that my decision will disappoint many in Manchester, particularly east Manchester, one of the most deprived areas of the country. Taking forward the conclusions of the report published today, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government will lead an ad hoc ministerial group to work with Manchester council and its partners to identify and bring forward a range of regeneration alternatives. The group will produce its first report by the end of March. Considerable support has been expressed in both Houses for the regeneration of Blackpool. My right hon. Friend has today announced a package of investment for the town worth close to £300 million.
	I seek the consent of the House to authorise eight small and eight large casinos, because I am satisfied that they do not pose the same level of risk— [ Interruption. ]

Andy Burnham: —because I am satisfied that they do not pose the same level of risk to the public as a regional casino. That said, my instinct is to proceed with caution at all times considering measures to protect young and vulnerable people. Therefore, any new casinos authorised by the order will be required to abide by strict new rules, including in respect of: providing non-gambling areas where customers can take a break from gambling; prohibiting the provision of free drinks to customers while they are gambling; prohibiting the use of credit cards to purchase chips or play gaming machines; ensuring that any cash machines are located away from gaming areas; and requiring casinos to have policies to identify problem gamblers and provide information about support for addiction. Operators who break those rules risk losing their licence, fines and up to 51 weeks' imprisonment.
	Taken together, those measures make up the toughest regulatory regime for gambling in the world, but today I am signalling my intention to go further still. Regulators, legislators, operators and owners all have a duty to act in a socially responsible manner, accepting that for some gambling is an addiction, not a leisure pursuit. I was surprised to find that only 360 of the 3,800 licensed operators have so far made contributions to the Responsibility in Gambling Trust this year, which offers advice and treatment to people with gambling addictions and is chaired so ably by the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway). That is not acceptable. Promises were made, and I expect them to be kept.
	The Archbishop of Canterbury has called for the introduction of a statutory levy. Unless the industry delivers a substantial increase in contributions by the end of this year and makes contributions in a timely fashion, I will seek the approval of the House for a statutory levy, at a rate to be determined. Secondly, I believe that it is a good principle that all casinos are subject to a period of closure every day, when individuals are required to leave the premises. Currently, casinos are prevented from offering gambling over 24 hours, unless they apply to local authorities for an extension. However, I wish to rule out the possibility that some may remain open round the clock, by requiring them to close their doors for at least six hours.
	In conclusion, the order we are laying today is an enabling order, giving 16 local authorities the ability to proceed with plans for small and large casinos. Whether to do so is entirely a matter for local decision, and I hope that local people will be consulted and involved at all stages.
	Small and large casinos will bring local economic benefits and provide enabling development with the potential to create new community facilities. But, as the Lancaster study concludes, there are costs and benefits of casino development that need to be weighed in the balance. That is why I shall at all times proceed with caution, and continue to keep gambling policy under review according to my responsibilities under the Act, to take advice from the Gambling Commission, and to be guided by the evidence. I commend this statement to the House.

Andy Burnham: It took time, but we got there in the end, and I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's indication of support for the order. I am also grateful for his words of support about the Responsibility in Gambling Trust and I would like to reiterate what I said in my statement—that our intention to introduce a statutory levy is very real, unless we see a significant improvement and unless payments are made in a more timely fashion. I understand that the trust needs to plan and make preparations for the year ahead. I emphasise again the importance of proceeding in a timely manner, and I hope that that will be heard beyond the House.
	The hon. Gentleman is also right to raise issues around online gambling. There is, of course, a connection between today's statement and the growing popularity of online gambling, but my statement was specifically about casino policy, which is why I did not deal with online gambling directly in it. I acknowledge the hon. Gentleman's concern, however, which is why we have asked the Gambling Commission to conduct further research of the data in order to find out more about the risks and causes of problem gambling on the internet. The hon. Gentleman mentioned the prevalence study, which found that the less than 1 per cent. level of problem gambling has remained unchanged. There can be no possibility of complacency on that matter, but the overall rate remains unchanged, although there has been an increase in online and other forms of gambling. As I say, we are not complacent and we keep these matters under review.
	The hon. Gentleman mentioned super-casinos and referred to the 16 large casinos, so let me explain again that today's order authorises eight large and eight small casinos, which are very different in character. They will include only machines that are currently available in casinos operational today. That is why I am satisfied that it is appropriate to authorise and move forward with these 16 identified casinos.
	On Manchester and Blackpool, the hon. Gentleman asked whether the Government would apologise, but if I understood it correctly, it was his policy to stand up against the potential for a casino in those locations, so he should make that point clear. We have put together a package of support for Blackpool, which I believe will be widely welcomed across the House and in the other place. It is worth close to £300 million and will take Blackpool further forward. We will also look closely into issues surrounding the regeneration of east Manchester, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government has made some announcements today that will begin that process. There is a serious intention to look into alternatives to casino-led regeneration.
	On the hon. Gentleman's last point about why there was no further action since last July, I remind him that all this did not begin last July, but in the House of Lords in March and it would have been arrogant of the Government not to have reflected on the views expressed in the other place and in this House, as we wanted carefully to consider how to take forward a casino policy that has a degree of consensus in Parliament. Following the local elections, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions wrote to local authorities—rightly, in my view, as the change of political complexion could have led to the emergence of different views on casino policy. Towards the end of last year, some local authorities asked for more time to make their judgments about whether to proceed with casinos, but by the end of the year they had all come back to us, indicating a wish to proceed. I then considered the evidence and consulted Cabinet colleagues in the devolved Administrations, which brings us to today's process. I believe that we were right to listen to concerns and in the end, as the hon. Gentleman himself concluded, the order before us is the right order.

Andy Burnham: I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. I am sure that he will join me in celebrating the success of the Manchester economy in recent times, and that he would want to pay tribute to the city council for the remarkable job it has done in bringing Manchester around from the position it was in in the 1980s and early 1990s. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government leads on regeneration matters, and I know that she was listening carefully to his comments.
	Of course, in east Manchester we are building on the legacy of a successful Commonwealth games. My Department has a role to play in ensuring that we build on that sporting legacy and further enhance the sporting potential of that region, and use it as a catalyst for regeneration. As we have seen, sport can be a catalyst for regeneration. I give my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman) an assurance—as I did a moment ago to my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Central—that we will work with good intent to develop a strong package that will respond to the needs that Manchester city council has put to us.

John Whittingdale: Is the Secretary of State aware that most people will regard his statement this afternoon as the final chapter in a saga of total shambles and incompetence? Does he understand the resentment that is bound to be felt in authorities such as Blackpool that chose to put in only an application for a regional casino licence? It is one thing to lose in fair competition, but the competition has now been scrapped entirely. Should such councils not at least have another opportunity to apply for a licence for a large or small casino?

Gordon Marsden: My right hon. Friend knows full well that his Department instigated the taskforce for Blackpool in the context of very strong support in both Houses for Blackpool's position last year. He referred to the statement and document from the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government about Blackpool's funding package. It remains to be seen how much of that is new and focused money, and that will obviously be examined carefully. Given the moral responsibility that his Department bears in this issue, will he use his good offices—his strongest offices—to work with the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government to ensure that those proposals are for new money and that they begin to fill the regeneration hole left by the removal of the prospect of a super-casino in Blackpool? Will he use his best endeavours, with his senior officials—

Malcolm Moss: Setting aside the illogicality of dishing up what I calculate to be more than half a billion pounds as a sop to Manchester and Blackpool, is it the case that, when the Secretary of State looks at the figures promised for Blackpool, he will see that two thirds of that £300 million has been committed already by other Departments?

Bernard Jenkin: Would the Minister accept that, for example, the French Conseil d'Etat regularly maintains a conflict between French administrative law and European Community law, and that that is not greeted as an invitation to leave the European Union? On the contrary, it becomes a political matter to be resolved. Were the United Kingdom expressly to create a non-conformity in terms of United Kingdom law with EC law, that would be a matter to be resolved politically, and not necessarily an invitation to leave the European Union.

Michael Connarty: I wanted to raise this matter as I was not sure whether the Minister was going to expand on the point. One part of the structure is for vice-presidencies during the six-month period, but has any thought been given to that role. There is certainly a sense of engagement in the present system—though I would also have to say that there are inefficiencies when the individual countries take up their six-month duties—but the promise made in the Convention, and after, was that countries would still be engaged in some sort of rotating vice-presidential role. Will the Minister elaborate further on that?

Jim Murphy: Time does not allow me to elaborate in much detail, apart from saying that the expectation was that rotating sectoral councils would continue under the auspices of the six-month rotating period. That might provide the opportunity that my hon. Friend alluded to, but, significantly, the office of president of the Council would no longer rotate.
	From 2014, the number of Commissioners will be reduced so that two thirds of member states provide a Commissioner at any one time, with every country taking equal turns. The members of the Commission will still, as now, be decided by national Governments, acting on qualified majority voting, and by the European Parliament. The treaty also reduces the size of the European Parliament, with the number of MEPs capped at 751—down from the current 785.
	The second group of reforms largely relate to better decision making and accountability.

Jim Murphy: Let me make some progress and I will happily give way to the hon. Gentleman later.
	The second group of changes relate to better decision making and accountability. This group of reforms alters the way in which the EU takes decisions and the means of accountability for them. It provides new powers for national parliaments; more effective decision making where it is in the UK's interests; and explicitly sets out the EU's competences—and where those competences end—for the first time.

Jim Murphy: It is absolutely clear that in the vast majority of cases—I will happily put what is available on the public record into the public domain—the UK is effective in achieving a blocking minority where we seek to do so, and that will be protected even further under the new arrangements that will be put in place by 2017 and the double majority voting changes.

James Clappison: I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. He has just said that he is happy with all the concessions made on qualified majority voting, but let us take just one example, although an important one: the QMV that the treaty introduces for proposals made by the new high representative. When this matter first came before the IGC, the Minister's predecessor, now the Secretary of State for Justice, opposed it, saying it was "simply unacceptable". Why did the Government at that time find it to be "simply unacceptable"?

William Cash: We had an exchange on this point this morning. Will the Minister be kind enough to tell me why he alleges that that legal personality is not new, when he must know that specific provisions demonstrate that it is? Admittedly, it is not new in respect of trade, but there are a range of other areas where it is. He must know that; surely he can concede that point.

William Hague: I beg to move amendment (b), in line 1, leave out from 'House' to end and add
	"disapproves of the Government's policy towards the Treaty of Lisbon in respect of the provisions on the effectiveness of European Union institutions and decision-making because the Treaty expands the power of EU institutions at Member States' expense by replacing the rotating presidency of the European Council with a permanent President, giving the EU a single legal personality, abolishing national vetoes in more than fifty areas and entrenching marine biological resources as an exclusive EU competence; notes that these provisions are largely identical to those in the original EU Constitution; further notes that the details of many of the new powers of the EU and its institutions will not be decided until after the Treaty is ratified; and regrets the Government's failure to secure the extensive changes Ministers sought to these provisions in the course of negotiations on this Treaty and its near-identical predecessor.'.
	It tells us something about the shortage of time in which we can debate these matters that we are already more than one third of the way through the period set aside for these motions on the effectiveness of EU institutions. Today's debate concerns some of the treaty's most important elements and they are notable not least because once again they mirror almost exactly the proposals of the EU constitution, on which all parties in the House—including the one that was in some difficulty earlier—pledged at the last election to hold a referendum.

William Hague: I said that the right hon. Gentleman's journey back to the Front Bench was long and arduous, but I think that it just became of infinite length. However, we will all enjoy his utterances from the Back Benches in the many decades to come.
	I must also take issue with the Minister for Europe, who, when asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) to list the remaining exclusive competences of the nation state, came up with a rather short list of what is left of the nation states, underlining the dramatic nature of what is in the treaty. He was pressed by some of his hon. Friends about the role of national Parliaments, and about how we in the House of Commons exercise our powers, or the powers that we have in this Chamber, to affect the decisions of Governments of either party about European decision making. He said that the Government would come up with further proposals on the subject, but they already had an opportunity to do so. The matter was debated only three weeks ago on the Floor of the House, when my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May), the shadow Leader of the House, made clear and substantive proposals: for instance, for a statutory scrutiny reserve, so that Ministers would have to gain parliamentary approval before negotiating in the Council of Ministers, as well as new powers for the European Scrutiny Committee to force a debate and vote in the House of Commons.
	It was only in response to Opposition pressure that the Government agreed to support the decision that produced the one substantive thing that happened in that debate—the decision to hold public meetings of the European Scrutiny Committee. The Government have had one opportunity to come up with substantive proposals for improving parliamentary scrutiny, and if they are really going to do so again, they should do it with great urgency, because there is enormous interest in the matter throughout the House.
	The treaty will introduce changes of great importance to the European Union's institutions and decision-making processes. The Minister mentioned most of them. They include, but are not limited to, the creation of a new president of the European Council; the endowment of the European Union—explicitly in a treaty, for the first time—with a single legal personality; the renamed EU Foreign Minister; the new delineation of competences between the EU and member states; the establishment of qualified majority voting with co-decision by the European Parliament as the ordinary legislative procedure; the various other increases in the powers of the European Parliament; the new vote-weighting system for the Council of the European Union; and, of course, the ratchet clause, by which further vetoes can be abolished in future without recourse to further treaties.

William Hague: My hon. Friend makes a good point, which could be made about so many aspects of the treaty that we are assured will make no difference, including the clarification—I think that is what the Minister called it—of the competences of the EU and the nation states. But if that is of no importance and only a clarification, why did the Government oppose the statement of so many of those competences? I shall come to that point in the course of my speech, which I will truncate in deference to the time and other hon. Members' need to speak.
	There is one argument that advocates of the treaty like to return to in this matter decision making: that is that without the treaty, an enlarged EU would not really be able to function. Tony Blair, the former Prime Minister, told the House that the constitution was
	"necessary to make the accession work"—[ Official Report, 14 May 2003; Vol. 405, c. 306.]
	but it has been more than three years since the great enlargement of the EU to 25 and subsequently 27 member states, and the EU is working perfectly well.
	The solid weight of testimony that the EU's existing structures have dealt more than adequately with enlargement is supplied partly by academic studies. The latest is a study by the distinguished member of the Government's Better Regulation Commission, Professor Helen Wallace, who has found not only that the picture is of business as usual rather than gridlock but that
	"non-treaty reforms have played important roles in altering processes and procedures so as to improve the capacity of the institutions to do their work".
	Current and former Foreign Secretaries, in unguarded moments of frankness, seem to agree. I remind the House of the words of the former Foreign Secretary, the right hon. Member for Derby, South (Margaret Beckett), which I have mentioned in earlier debates on the Bill. Last year, she told the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs that
	"there have been comments from various quarters that if the European Union cannot get an agreement"
	on treaty reform
	"there will be a huge crisis and that the EU will no longer be able to function...the last few months have shown that that is not actually so. The EU is functioning and has, indeed, reached some quite far-reaching decisions".
	If people do not listen to the previous Foreign Secretary, I hope that they will at least listen to the current one, who said that the EU's agreements on climate change
	"have done more to show the relevance of the European Union than any amount of institutional tinkering",
	and I fully agree with him on that.

William Hague: Of course I will give way again to the hon. Gentleman, but let me just finish my point; otherwise, my speech will become as long as that made by the Minister, who generously gave way many times.
	It has been said that the treaty will make it easier for new legislation to be passed in the EU, but people in businesses up and down the land are not protesting about the lack of EU regulations and directives. Indeed, the latest British Chambers of Commerce burdens barometer, published less than a fortnight ago, shows that the vast majority—71 per cent.—of new burdens on business since 1997 have their origin in the EU. The Prime Minister, if not the right hon. Member for Rotherham, might agree with that figure. As those burdens have cost British businesses nearly £47 billion, making it easier for the EU to create more regulations should not really be high on our list of national priorities. The Prime Minister stated that it was "unacceptable" that 50 per cent. or more of regulations come from the European Union, although the Government have got into the habit of saying that they were merely asking a searching question whenever there is reference to anything that they said was unacceptable—that was what the Foreign Secretary did last week. Yet again, the Government's stated aim in Europe of having less regulation bears no relation to the policy that they are actually pursuing.
	One of the fundamental changes that the treaty makes was referred to by the hon. Member for Preston (Mr. Hendrick)—the change to the work of the European Council and the Council of Ministers. The rotating presidency has been a permanent feature of the EU since its inception as the European Economic Community. It has survived thus far because it has helped to root the EU in the member states—each country has had its chance at the helm to highlight its priorities—and it has helped to give people some sense of ownership of what is going on in Europe. It is fair to say that the EU's enlargement means that the system would benefit from some reform; I can agree with the hon. Gentleman to that extent. Not every member state has the capacity to manage a presidency by itself, and the gap between presidencies has become very long. We support the sensible reform of introducing team presidencies for Council formations; the treaty allows for that. In my view, that should have been the pattern for the presidency of the Council itself.

William Hague: We may be getting away from the effectiveness of EU decision making, but I strongly disagree with the hon. Gentleman. He is not being fair to some of the efforts made in Turkey in recent years, although of course it has a long way to go. It is of huge geopolitical importance that the European Union should be able to welcome Turkish membership in the coming years. Obviously, the hon. Gentleman and I will have to disagree on that, but I think that there is agreement in various parts of the House that the treaty will not help with Turkish accession, much though that might fortify the hon. Gentleman's enthusiasm for the treaty.
	Before those interventions, I was speaking about possible ways of reforming the presidencies of the European Council. The choice that has been made in the treaty is the creation of a permanent president. That is a mistake. If Ministers are sincere in their apparent belief that that will strengthen the role of member states in the EU, their naiveté about how political institutions work is rather alarming.
	A central institution will necessarily develop different goals and interests from the member states. To claim, as the Minister for Europe did last week, that that is nothing to worry about because there is already a president of the European Council is unconvincing. Having a national Head of Government preside over meetings for six months is not at all the same thing as having an EU figure separate from national Governments in place for at least two and a half years, nor does it convey the ambitious role that the presidency is set to play.
	One explanatory memorandum submitted to the European Union Committee in another place helpfully set out the president's role in some detail. It is worth taking note of the memorandum as it came from the Government, in the form of the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain). First, it said, the president is to chair and take forward the European Council's work. That is fairly obvious, but anyone with the slightest familiarity with the way in which political institutions work, which surely includes all of us in the House, knows that whoever chairs a meeting and manages its agenda is, in effect, in charge of it. The chairing of the Cabinet, for instance, is fundamental to the power of the Prime Minister of this country and was part of the development of the power of the Prime Minister.
	When that meeting is as important as the European Council, it makes its president in his capacity as chairman a very significant figure indeed. As the memorandum goes on, the president would provide
	"a much more serious co-ordinating role than can be done by a job that changes every six months"
	and would co-ordinate and prepare the work of the General Affairs Council. Taken together, the president would take the lead in setting and running the EU's whole work programme from the Council's side—a crucial role that would play a huge part in deciding what the EU actually does.
	As we have pointed out before, in the hands of a skilful politician—it would be bizarre to think that future presidents would not be exactly that—the post-holder could use his or her powers to become the leading figure in the European Union. To take the role out of— [Interruption.] If the Government think they will ever succeed in nominating me for that, they have another thing coming. To take the role out of the hands of national Governments holding it by rotation and place it in the hands of a single figure sitting at the Council table not as the representative of a nation state, but in his own right, is a fundamental change to how the EU works and it is one further illustration why there should be a referendum.
	The presidency is set to play an ambitious role. According to the Government's memorandum, the president's job is
	"to increase Europe's global influence"
	and to be the person
	"to whom the foreign Presidents pick up the phone".
	On this, the Government are in happy agreement with the European Commission which, in a briefing paper, explains explicitly that the president is designed to answer Kissinger's famous question, "Who do I call if I want to call Europe?"
	The Government know full well that there are others in Europe putting the case for, eventually, direct election to that position, who believe that the establishment of the position in the treaty will open the way to that in another 10 or 15 years. That would mean a huge shift of political authority away from national Governments, and in the treaty the Government are opening the door to that. Given the importance of the post, it is extraordinary that crucial questions about how it would work in practice, what staff or secretariat would be at its service, and how, given its foreign policy role, it would interact with the High Representative, have yet to be decided after the scrutiny of the treaty has been completed and after we have lost any opportunity to have a further say about it.
	It was noteworthy that of all witnesses that the Foreign Affairs Committee asked about how the two posts would relate to each other, only the current High Representative thought there would be no problem—an interesting pre-emptive strike in the bureaucratic turf war that the treaty will set in play.
	It is not helpful to the Government's newly favoured candidate, Mr. Tony Blair, who, it is reported, is interested in the job only if it is sufficiently important, that even his ardent advocate, the Minister for Europe, is unable to tell him whether it is worth his while because its powers have not been defined. The former Prime Minister agreed to create a post whose powers had not been set, but which someone of his abilities could very easily expand.
	Although the EU's institutions are working, there is no doubt that they could work better. One or two improvements are even in the treaty. We welcome the provision for open voting in the Council of the European Union, and I am pleased that after supporting this move and then opposing it, the Government reverted to their original position. The reduction in the number of Commissioners is also welcome, although it would be naive to represent that as taking some great scythe to European bureaucracy. It is not a cost-free reform, because there would be times when some nations with tens of millions of citizens would have no representative on the European Commission. I suspect that when we come to 2014, that will not be the end of the story.
	In the light of these modest but welcome changes that were secured, it is particularly regrettable that the reactive way that the Government have approached the matter from the beginning left them unable to secure highly desirable reforms. It is astonishing that the Government made such vast concessions on so many subjects to which they attached great importance in the strongest possible terms, but they were unable to obtain even mild concessions commanding wide-ranging support in the EU, such as the establishment of a single seat for the European Parliament which, by ending the current nonsense of the endless procession between Brussels and Strasbourg, would have saved the European taxpayer €200 million a year.

William Hague: I have given way to the hon. Gentleman twice, and half of the debate has gone by, so I want to skip through much of what I was going to say.
	If we take these matters together—this movement of competences, the creation of the single legal personality, the creation of the presidency, the abolition of intergovernmental safeguards on criminal justice and policing, and the EU's new powers and role in foreign policy and defence, which we discussed last week—this paves the way for a more powerful role for the EU at the expense of nation states across the board.
	This enhancement of the EU's powers should be of particular concern to the House, because for the first time an EU treaty seems to impose—the Minister discussed this in his speech and it can be argued in different directions—a legal duty on national Parliaments to the EU. He partly had that debate earlier with the Chairman of the Scrutiny Committee, so I will not go further into that now.
	It should be a matter of deep regret to Ministers that national Parliaments, which, for all their faults, are the one institution to which the peoples of Europe feel clear attachment and ownership, are the big losers in the renamed EU constitution. The loss of what even the Minister now admits comes to a total of more than 50 national vetoes, the expansion of the EU's powers over criminal justice, and all the other provisions that we have debated in broad outline over the past days, add up to a substantial loss of power for the House. More and more decisions will be made at the EU level over which the House will have little control, leaving our constituents, the voters, with fewer meaningful political levers to pull to secure their views and interests. In a century and a society where people feel that decisions are taken too remotely, it will mean that more of those decisions are taken more remotely still.
	All that national Parliaments have in compensation is one very small step to the better monitoring of EU proposals in the so-called orange card on subsidiarity. We welcome the small move that it represents, but we must be realistic about how little it means. The German constitutional court described the provision last week as ineffective and impractical. Given the indifference with which the Government have treated the views and input of Parliament and public in their negotiations on the treaty, and their utter disregard for their election promises, we have every right to be cynical about the Government's intentions on openness and accountability in the EU and the future use of these powers.
	We look forward with interest to the Government's response to our amendments next week on the ratchet clause, which will ensure that no more national vetoes could be abolished without primary legislation. If they and other parties are at all sincere in their claims to support parliamentary control and scrutiny over the Executive's actions in the EU, they will support that amendment.
	I have touched briefly on the weighted voting procedures as they would affect Turkish accession and I will leave it to my hon. Friends and others to debate those in more detail, as I have already been speaking for half an hour.
	When taken as a whole, the treaty is not needed by an EU that is coping with enlargement well enough. It does little to improve the EU's efficiency or its decision-making processes, while failing to deal with some issues that do need reform. It weakens still further the role of national Parliaments and above all shifts power away from member states to the EU's central institutions. Its provisions are not in the British interest, nor are they what the Government wanted. Its contents are a testimony to the weakness of the Government's negotiating skills and their want of vision for Europe. Where Europe needs flexibility, the treaty brings rigidity, and where it needs to change to let power flow from the bottom up, it gathers it to political institutions remote from electorates. It is a document born of a political vision for Europe out of place in the 21st century. The whole European project would benefit from its rejection, but, most importantly, its importance and profound effects on the way that this country is governed, merit a decision of the British people in the referendum that they were promised.

Patricia Hewitt: My hon. Friend and I have a completely different view of the EU. His description of a purely voluntary co-operation between independent nation states does not represent the European Community as it was originally formulated. There has always been, within the EU and the Communities that preceeded it, a pooling of sovereignty where the Member States see real advantage to their own national interest and their own people in doing so. My hon. Friend does not agree with that and I respect his view, but I profoundly disagree with it.
	To reinforce the point, I point out that the EU has led the world in shaping a different kind of institution suited to the demands of an interdependent world, which does not represent an end to the nation state, or some kind of new imperial force located in Brussels, which is the threat that is so often conjured up on the Opposition Benches, but rather a pooling of sovereignty for specific purposes by nation states, which in my view, and I believe that of the Government, is in our interests. There is a clear dividing line—not so much between my hon. Friend and me, but between the Labour and Conservative parties.
	It is also the case that the institutions of the European Union have to evolve with its changing nature and, particularly, its changing size. I was surprised by the vehemence with which the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks attacked what I have always seen as an immensely commonsensical proposal for a European Council president whose term would last two and a half years rather than six months. It seemed to me and most commentators that that was essential as the European Union enlarged.
	Let me, for once, pay tribute to Margaret Thatcher, who as Prime Minister championed the enlargement of the European Union to include the countries of central and eastern Europe which had so recently escaped from the dominance of the Soviet Union. I have no doubt that all of us who supported that enlargement should now be supporting the changes in the workings of the EU, in particular the creation of a new Council president, that so many of us believe are essential if an enlarged EU is to work effectively.
	A further point is that the creation of that presidency is not only essential in respect of enlargement, but will enhance the power of member states by enhancing the power and effectiveness of the Council itself. I prefer not the view taken by the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks, but that taken by one of the very eminent advisers appointed by the leader of the Conservative party. I refer, of course, to Dame Pauline Neville-Jones, a member of the senior expert group, which has concluded:
	"The creation of the post of the President of the European Council, making the European Council an institution in its own right"
	amounts
	"to an increase in the power of the Member States within the EU's structures."
	That view is also shared by a former Conservative Foreign Secretary, Lord Howe.

Patricia Hewitt: I entirely agree. My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point. Whether on climate change or on a whole range of economic issues, the largest single market in the world needs to be able to operate effectively—and, when there is agreement, to speak with a single voice—if we are to have the influence that we need, not only on the United States but on China, India and other emerging countries.
	In this debate, much has already been made about the extension of qualified majority voting. It is absurd for the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks to complain that we have not secured an end to the rotation of the European Parliament between Brussels and Strasbourg—I entirely agree on that point; we should get rid of the nonsense of the Strasbourg sittings—while opposing the extension of qualified majority voting. Applying QMV to the location of the Parliament would be the only way in which we could get rid of the sittings in Strasbourg.
	When I was Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, I spent many happy hours representing the United Kingdom within the World Trade Organisation; there are national representations as well as the EU's at the WTO. I am not proposing that the WTO should be reformed along the lines of the European Union—it is a different organisation with different purposes, although its reform is clearly needed. However, an organisation that operates on the basis that no decision can be made except through the unanimous decision of every single one of its members finds it increasingly difficult to arrive at any decisions at all. We are finding that out, to the great detriment of developing countries in relation to the Doha development round.
	I entirely agree with the point made by the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr. Taylor), who is no longer in his place. Qualified majority voting forces member states to rely on argument and persuasion rather than on veto, and in practice it enables us to overcome the protectionist instincts that, unfortunately, still exist among some of our European colleagues. Frankly, overcoming those would be greatly in all our interests. In most cases, the treaty's extension of qualified majority voting relates to procedural, bureaucratic and technical matters, but it also relates to important issues such as energy policy. Given that, under the reformed voting procedure, the United Kingdom will have a greater share of the votes within the Council of Ministers, the treaty's provisions are wholly in our national interest.
	I should like to make a brief point about national Parliaments. The treaty's requirement that the Commission submit its proposals directly to Parliaments when they are submitted to the European Parliament and the Council is immensely helpful, and I look forward to the debates in this House that will make full use of that provision. The treaty gives more power to national Parliaments, member states, the United Kingdom and—through the power for petitions—to the publics of our own country and of the rest of the European Union. The Conservative party opposes all that, confirming that it is irredeemably the party of the past and not the future. If that was not bad enough, it compounds that grave error by threatening to reopen the treaty even if or when it is ratified by every EU member state. It calls for a completely different treaty on which it has no support across the European Union.

Jo Swinson: I certainly find it incredibly disappointing that we are not able to debate the amendment that stands in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam. We feel very passionately about this, as is evidenced. However, I must return to the amendment that has been selected.

Jo Swinson: I will give way again shortly; I should like to make some progress.
	The current six-month rotating presidency is clearly not a sensible system for the European Council. It means that the body lacks direction and consistency. Like many Members, I was pleased to see the focus that the UK Government gave to the Make Poverty History campaign during the last UK presidency of the European Council. While some progress was made on that front, I believe that much more could and should have been achieved. A longer presidency with proper time to set an agenda and follow through on issues is therefore a good idea. In the context of the extension of the term for this role, we were all very entertained on Second Reading, and then a little again today, by the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) and his imagery of a supreme president Blair—perish the thought. Although he paints a very memorable picture, away from fantasy land the reality is that the president of the European Council proposed in the treaty does not gain additional powers and the role will remain the same as it is now, but with a slightly less frantic turnover of occupants.
	There are genuine concerns about how the president of the European Council, the President of the Commission and the new expanded high representative role will interact. I understand those concerns and would like to hear more from the Minister about how those roles will be clearly defined and made to be complementary to one another rather than in constant conflict.
	Let me turn to the Council of Ministers. The moves towards qualified majority voting in this respect are arguably less significant than in the Maastricht treaty. As we have heard, 16 areas will not apply to the UK or are areas for which we have negotiated opt-ins, 14 are purely procedural, and the rest are clearly in the UK national interest. We have heard in previous debates about the British entrepreneurs who will be helped by facilitating self-employment in other member states, the British businesses that will benefit from better co-ordination of intellectual property rights, the advantages in making EU humanitarian aid operations more streamlined, and the energy liberalisation aspect. In those cases, the move to QMV helps the UK by reducing the likelihood of such welcome measures being blocked by states that are perhaps less enlightened and less committed to market liberalisation. As we heard from the hon. Member for Preston (Mr. Hendrick), the changes to the way in which QMV is calculated in the Council are also clearly in the national interest because the power of the UK's vote will go up from 8 per cent. to 12 per cent. Given the general dislike on the Tory Benches of anything being decided in Brussels, even on clearly trans-national issues such as climate change or cross-border crime, I wonder why they do not welcome that stronger voice for the UK in these discussions.

Jo Swinson: We certainly want to ensure that cross-border crime is dealt with swiftly, and in measures relating to that the UK must examine any of the proposals that come forward and decide on them on their merits—it is as simple as that. To take the opposite view and say that there is never any point in co-ordinating with our international colleagues could place us in a situation whereby we were unable to tackle drug trafficking, people-trafficking and the horrendous crimes that need to be tackled.
	On the European Commission, there is an old maxim, with which I am sure that Members are familiar, that a camel is a horse designed by committee. I am sure that those of us with experience in politics know that that can be true and that the larger the committee, the more unwieldy it becomes. With 27 member states, the Commission faced that very problem, and it is eminently sensible to move to reduce its size. Indeed, even the Conservatives have agreed that that is a welcome move. This morning, I attended a debate about the western Balkans where many Members said that it would be welcome to see other Balkan states gaining accession to the EU. That issue will clearly become more important as the number of member states increases.

Jo Swinson: I will certainly try to resist that temptation, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
	I will just say that the two things are very different for the following reason. The constitution would have abolished all the preceding treaties: Rome, Nice, Amsterdam, Maastricht and the Single European Act. Therefore, a vote on the constitution would have been a de facto vote on in or out, so an in-or-out referendum would actually be on the substantive issue. We support such a referendum; we will continue to campaign for it and hope that it will find favour in this House. I also welcome the citizens initiative idea, which may need to be developed or changed. Time will tell how much it is used, but the principle of trying to connect better with the electorate is a good one.
	Extending the time for national Parliaments to consider legislation is obviously a good idea. There are many practical difficulties, such as different parliamentary timetables, recess dates and so on, that make six weeks inadequate. Is eight weeks enough? We will have to see, but it is certainly a step in the right direction, and it could be the subject of further review. We also heard about the yellow card, which is an important innovation for the protection of subsidiarity, and one that Conservative Front Benchers felt minded to agree with.
	Last Wednesday, during the foreign policy debate, we discussed in more detail the role of the high representative, and without going over that ground again, let me just say that it is sensible to have one set of offices, rather than two, working on the EU's external relations, with one individual responsible. That removes confusion and strengthens the voice of the EU where there is unanimity, and it therefore amplifies the view of the UK on such issues.
	A legal personality for the EU is not the huge move that the Tories would have us believe. Many organisations have legal personality, from the United Nations to the Universal Postal Union, and indeed the European Community that preceded the European Union also had such status.
	Despite the scaremongering we have seen on the passerelle clause, there is a secure triple lock that will, importantly, enable the reduction of EU powers. In any case, before any change is made to voting arrangements, the European Parliament, Council and national Parliaments must all agree, so this House will retain the final say.
	Finally, new article 49(a) in the Maastrict treaty, or the Treaty on European Union, explicitly sets out how a member state would go about withdrawing from the EU. For most of our constituents, this article gets to the nub of the debate they are having about Europe—to the extent that they are engaged in such a debate at all. What is Britain's future? Is it as a strong voice in the EU, with more global influence, or is it outside, weak and isolated? It would be welcome to have such a debate in the country, and as you know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I am disappointed that we will not be voting on that issue today.
	I know that there are many members on the Conservative Benches who subscribe to the Better Off Out campaign, and as much as I disagree with them, they are entitled to their views. I find it only a little strange that they are by and large opposing moves in the treaty that set an explicit framework for countries to be able to leave the EU should they wish. That seems a bit of a strange position.
	The changes will help the EU to work better. Although the Union will still obviously be far from perfect, they are a step in the right direction. Therefore, we will not support the amendment that has been selected. It is a shame, however, that we will not have the opportunity to vote on the amendment in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam.

Bernard Jenkin: That member state would be in breach of the treaty. Let us be clear: there is no remit for the court in those matters—at least, that is the way in which I currently interpret the treaty—but that member state would be in breach of international law, which would be a serious matter. If we think that that is likely to happen, we should not sign the treaty.
	Let us consider the other major innovation in defence in the Lisbon treaty. It is called "permanent structured co-operation". Again, I submit that, over time, it will become the framework in which all member states have to conduct their defence policies.
	Article 42(6) of the consolidated treaty states:
	"Those Member States whose military capabilities fulfil higher criteria and which have made more binding commitments to one another in this area with a view to the most demanding missions shall establish permanent structured cooperation within the Union framework."
	That refers to a small group of states that gets together to go further and faster than their counterparts.
	Article 46(2) makes it clear that
	"the Council shall adopt a decision establishing permanent structured cooperation...by qualified majority voting".
	Permanent structured co-operation is therefore established by QMV. The obligations on member states are shown in the second protocol to the treaty. They are onerous. The protocol refers to a member state undertaking
	"to develop its defence capacities through the development of its national contributions and participation, where appropriate, in multinational forces".
	Let us be clear: the commitment of forces is a matter for unanimity, which is what the Government keep stating. However, paragraph 4 of article 46 of the consolidated texts says:
	"If a participating Member State no longer fulfils the criteria or is no longer able to meet the commitments referred to in Articles 1 and 2 of the Protocol...the Council may...act by a qualified majority"
	to remove that member from the structured co-operation. With the conjunction of those double qualified majority votes, the European Union's policy is effectively removed from the scope of a single member state's veto. It is therefore completely untrue that unanimity is the rule in defence, as the Government keep insisting.
	Let us step back from the detail for a minute. From defence being barely mentioned as a possibility at Maastricht, there is now a clear direction, with the introduction of the new decision-making mechanisms and institutions in the Lisbon treaty. First we had the St. Malo agreement. The then Prime Minister insisted at Amsterdam that the Western European Union should not become another EU institution, but he allowed that to happen at Nice. The Government opposed the whole principle of permanent structured co-operation because, as the then Minister, the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), said, it would
	"undermine the inclusive, flexible, model of ESDP that the EU has agreed";
	but here it is in the treaty, and it is easy to see the risks of allowing such an institution into the EU treaties.
	Permanent structured co-operation is the new defence decision-making mechanism in the Lisbon treaty, which, to quote from the protocol, claims to herald
	"a new stage in the development of the European security and defence policy".
	The provisions are therefore not just a tidying exercise; they are a big step forward. We know that the French intend to make defence a major priority of their presidency. The Government say that the provisions of title V remain intergovernmental in character, but the House must be aware that the term "intergovernmental" is not a precise term. NATO represents classic intergovernmentalism, but EU intergovernmentalism involves an altogether more fluid and dynamic structure, reflected in the mechanisms for decision making that I have described. The all-important relationship between NATO and European security and defence policy remains, however, ill defined and paralysed by technical disputes, with no certainty about who does what in the event of an international crisis, as the Secretary-General of NATO himself said just a year ago.
	The Lisbon treaty institutions and decision making will relegate NATO primacy to the status of a constitutional monarch: largely ceremonial and largely irrelevant to the day-to-day functioning of defence policy in the European Union. We would do well to recall Bismarck's adage:
	"I have always found the word 'Europe' on the lips of those...who wanted something from others...which they dared not demand in their own names".
	The real security threats to the European Union that European militaries should address lie far from our shores. Afghanistan is the most immediately pressing security issue currently facing the European Union. If the new EU institutions and decision-making mechanisms were seriously going to help the Europe in, to quote the treaty,
	"fully assuming its responsibilities within the international community",
	its members would be actively fulfilling the combined joint statement of requirements for the NATO mission in Afghanistan and not leaving the bulk of the fighting to NATO's Anglophone members.

Bernard Jenkin: I am not going to give way, as I am just concluding my remarks.
	But while Europe fiddles with ESDP, NATO burns in Afghanistan. While the Government scratch their head over how to persuade other NATO members to widen burden sharing, the EU continues to support EU defence institutions and decision making, which has reinforced the idea among most European nations that somehow Europe will provide the defence that they are not willing to pay for themselves.

Bill Wiggin: I should like to talk about competences, and about marine biological resources in particular. Instead of having a debate about the levels at which marine biological resources and the marine environment are best managed, and clarifying those responsibilities in a directive or treaty that would hand more powers back to the UK, we are being forced to accept EU "exclusive competence". I fear that, once this power grab—which is codified in articles 2B and 2C of the Lisbon treaty, and is identical to the provisions in the EU constitution—has taken place, it will be difficult ever to reverse or amend the problem in the future. Most importantly of all, however, the measures will not materially benefit our marine environment, and will damage our conservation efforts.
	In the past, we have seen the EU frustrate our efforts to protect the marine environment, which in the UK includes more than 44,000 animal and plant species. French pair trawlers are able to operate up to six nautical miles from our coast, crushing, wounding, drowning and killing porpoises and dolphins, which are supposed to be protected under EU law. The Government banned our fishermen from using this harmful practice, but the European Commission rejected their proposal to make this ban effective for all vessels fishing within the 12 nautical mile limit.
	The Fisheries Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Jonathan Shaw), said:
	"We banned pair trawling in the western channel. We do not have the ability to ban French vessels...We presented our argument in Europe and we took unilateral action to ban pair trawling—that constitutes taking an effective measure."
	Now, he is not a bad chap and he had the decency to blush a sort of salmon pink on the top of his head as he went on:
	"We argued our case and we were unable to persuade others, but we are taking action ourselves."—[ Official Report, 31 January 2008; Vol. 471, c. 456.]
	Well, I say tell that to the families who might have the misfortune find a dead cetacean washed up on the beach. That really that is not good enough at all. Given the Government's own admission that the EU has already blocked our domestic efforts to protect our marine mammals, can it really be trusted with exercising "exclusive competence" in this matter?

Bill Wiggin: It would be so simple to put that down to the fact that they are single-species fisheries, but I believe that they also manage their fisheries very well. We have a separate set of problems with mixed fisheries such as the North sea. Now I really must hurry on.
	The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs says that it has appointed itself the
	"UK policy custodian for the marine and aquatic environment",
	committed to delivering
	"clean, safe, healthy, productive and biologically diverse oceans and seas."
	Well, not any more. How can it be the "policy custodian" for our seas when the Government are surrendering all powers in this area to Brussels? The Lisbon treaty refers to
	"marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy",
	but it is uncertain whether that provision could extend to covering most of the marine environment.
	The Government have already admitted—for example, in the 2004 strategy unit report "Net Benefits", and in the discussions over the marine strategy directive—that the present marine management arrangements between the EU and the UK are unclear. However, they have refused to take action to elucidate them. If given "exclusive competence", what action could the EU take to protect the pink sea fans in Lyme bay, where there is a conflict between conservationists and scallop dredgers, or to protect the sea bed that is so important to those corals?
	During the marine Bill consultation, more than 90 per cent. of respondents believed that existing measures to protect marine species were not adequate. What a damning indictment of EU and Government policies. This year, the draft marine Bill is expected to be published, but Ministers have already conceded that any marine conservation zones and protected areas implemented under the Bill would have no legal force over vessels with historical fishing rights between our six and 12 nautical mile limits. There could be many more occasions like the discussion on the pair trawling ban, when Ministers stroll down to Brussels, make their case and desperately plead with the Commission's pen-pushing bureaucrats, only to have their ambitions torn apart and thrown out, and then return to Britain defeated and without the necessary protection for our marine environment.
	The development of marine spatial plans could be affected by discord between Brussels and the UK. Brussels could also interfere in sea-bed mining and dredging, in the interests of upholding
	"the conservation of marine biological resources."
	Before the much-promised marine Bill has even been presented to Parliament in draft form, the Government have already acted to dilute the Bill's contents and benefits by accepting the Lisbon treaty. They have accepted that
	"more needs to be done to better manage and protect our seas",
	but they can hardly take decisive action if they need to run off to get permission from Brussels.
	Just 0.001 per cent. of UK seas benefit from the highest level of protection, namely the 3.3 sq km Lundy marine nature reserve. That is an area equivalent to the size of Kensington gardens. Sir David Attenborough has stated:
	"As an island nation, I find it astonishing that we have protected less than a thousandth of one per cent of our seas from fishing and all damaging activities."
	It is indeed ridiculous. At present, there are two types of protected marine area for nature conservation. The first are the marine nature reserves, of which there are just three—Lundy, Skomer and Strangford lough—and the Government have no intention of designating any more. If the plan envisaged in the treaty goes ahead, I doubt that they would be able to, either. The second are the European marine sites, of which there are more than 100 in the UK, but they cover a very limited range of habitats, such as
	"sandbanks which are slightly covered by sea water all the time",
	where fishing, dredging and other activities continue. For example, the Fal estuary, a protected European site, is being damaged by scallop dredging.
	The public want to see more of our seas protected. A survey last year found that 78 per cent. of the public thought the UK's seas were important, and that 94 per cent. rated as important the health of the marine environment. We have to ask why the Government did not use the Lisbon treaty as an opportunity to bring powers back to the UK for environmental benefits, and to strengthen out ability to protect our seas. We need to ensure that our forthcoming marine Bill can actually offer the protection that we all want it to provide.

Mark Francois: It is a privilege to follow the hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty), the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee. As usual, he spoke with considerable authority on these matters. He knows that I like to quote him from time to time, particularly when he said on the "Today" programme of the Government's red lines that they would "leak like a sieve"—a very important quote, which bears frequent repetition when we are debating the treaty of Lisbon.
	I will refer briefly to the amateur dramatics that we saw earlier from the Liberal Democrats. They are making great play of this "in-out" referendum. All I will say, and very briefly, Mr. Deputy Speaker, is that there was no reference in their manifesto to an in-out referendum; indeed, they argued for a referendum on the EU constitution, so they have no democratic mandate for the stunt that they pulled in the House this afternoon.
	Today's debate has considered some of the core issues of the treaty: the new EU president, the new definition and distribution of the EU's powers, the single legal personality, the abolition of more than 50 vetoes, the expansion of the European Parliament's powers and the ratchet clause. Yet the debate has had a slightly surreal quality because many of the decisions about how the new institutions will work in practice have yet to be taken.
	The House has been asked to discuss and scrutinise what amounts to a pig in a poke. To take one example, the European External Action Service is one of the most important institutional innovations in the treaty, but we are in ignorance of answers to crucial questions. As one former German ambassador to the EU put it:
	"What will be the share of member states"
	within the EEAS,
	"I don't know. These are all open questions".
	Those are, in fact, vital questions, to which Ministers do not have answers. I think that that is a shame and the fact that the Government have allowed such a position to arise provides an example of how little they care about their duty to be accountable to Parliament, let alone the British people.
	There can be little doubt that, taken as a whole, the treaty is the most fundamental change to the EU's structure since its foundation. The intergovernmental nature of decision making on criminal justice and policing, where direct national democratic accountability is vital, is fully absorbed into the Community system, the Commission having the main right of initiative, co-decision with the European Parliament and full jurisdiction by the European Court of Justice. That is a fundamental change, as the chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee—if he can bear me quoting him twice— has previously said. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) has also explained, the new president of the European Council will transform the way in which the European Council is run. This process is also an example of how the treaty does not end institutional debate in the EU, but sets new dynamics in train.
	As we repeatedly mention, because it bears repetition, the relationship between the proposed president and the new high representative—the Foreign Minister under another name—has not been worked out. As Brian Crowe, deputy director of Chatham House and former director general for external and politico-military affairs in the Council of the European Union, argued in a recent article and parliamentary brief, the president
	"is to represent the EU 'at his or her level', which is one thing for attendance at EU summits with third countries, quite another if (as will always be the temptation for former heads of government who are likely to get the job) he seeks to cut a figure on the world stage competitively with the EU High Representative."
	Who could he have been referring to, we wonder, when he made that comment? It is exactly right.

Mark Francois: If that is the case, why have the Government been struggling so hard to retain blocking minorities on those two directives? I am afraid that is a question that he has not been able to answer.
	In relation to qualified majority voting, the treaty marks a major shift in the EU's way of working. For the first time, the system whereby the Commission proposes legislation and the Council votes on it in co-decision with the European Parliament becomes, in the words of the treaty, the "ordinary legislative procedure". As the Chairman of the European Scrutiny Committee has also said—I follow his words very closely—the fact that co-decision with the European Parliament under the treaty will now apply in some 95 per cent. of cases represents another "fundamental, massive change". He is right, and it is because of such fundamental changes that the treaty has an importance that merits the referendum we were promised.
	My right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks referred to the language in which the treaty sets out the EU's competences, which is copied almost word for word from the EU constitution. Let me develop one point further. As my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Bill Wiggin) observed, it is an innovation for the conservation of marine biological resources to be set out as an exclusive competence in the treaties. Such an entrenchment of case law is, in this instance, an illustration of the failure of what is described as the "EU reform treaty" to tackle areas in which the EU needs to undertake real reform. So far, the common fisheries policy has been less an area of EU competence than one of EU incompetence. Far form conserving marine biological resources—or fish, as they are usually called in English—the common fisheries policy means that our seas have fewer of them. The direction of policy travel should be the opposite direction.
	Let me end by making some observations about the passerelle or ratchet clauses. We shall have further opportunities to discuss them next week, but the new, almost all-embracing simplified revision procedure marks one of the treaty's most important innovations. I think it is a sign of the draftsmen's intent that it makes it so easy for the EU to get rid of remaining vetoes in this way. It must be a matter of regret that there is no comparable simplified revision procedure to reverse the ratchet. There is such a provision, incidentally, in the new ordinary revision procedure, for which we have the Czech Government to thank—which I do—but the hurdle is very high. If the House is to exercise any real control over the development of Britain's future in Europe, it is therefore vital for us to have the safeguard that the simplified revision procedure, or ratchet clause, cannot be used without primary legislation. Important Committees of the House have argued for that in examining the treaty, and we support their contention wholeheartedly.
	The treaty does not make the EU more efficient, or improve the quality of decision making. It sets institution against institution, and diminishes the role of member states. It fails to respond to the EU's crisis of the democratic deficit—the crisis which, as those with long memories will recall, the whole treaty process was launched to address at the Laeken European council meeting in December 2001. Throughout that process the Government's approach has been reactive, not proactive, favouring damage limitation over strategic vision. How often the Government have tabled amendments that have been defeated, and then described them to the House as searching questions. Why did they not search further, and insist that those amendments be made?
	Instead of real change, we are offered an intensification of existing centralising tendencies. It is for those reasons that the treaty should be rejected and, ultimately, put to the British people in the referendum that they were so solemnly promised in the first place.

Helen Goodman: We have had an excellent debate on matters that are central to the Lisbon treaty. It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Rayleigh (Mr. Francois), who gave his usual robust performance.
	The aim of the treaty is to reform and streamline the enlarged EU's institutions and decision making. The preamble to the treaty states that the 27 member states drew it up
	"to complete the process started by the Treaty of Amsterdam and by the Treaty of Nice with a view to enhancing the efficiency and democratic legitimacy of the Union and to improving the coherence of its action".
	The right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) began by speaking to the Conservative amendment, which purports to criticise the expansion of the
	"power of EU institutions at Member States' expanse".
	That proposition is fundamentally mistaken. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester, West (Ms Hewitt) pointed out, the United Kingdom is stronger in a strong European Union. The United Kingdom can influence global issues for the better as a major player in the Union, and effective decision making in the EU enables us to pursue our agenda in Europe.
	The right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks criticised the proposal to introduce a president of the European Council. He suggested that a comparison could be made between that new permanent, or semi-permanent, presidential role and the role of the Prime Minister in this country. Of course, he omitted to refer to some very significant differences. For example, the Prime Minister makes appointments to the rest of the Government, whereas the president of the European Council will be appointed by the Council. Furthermore, the president of the European Council will have no vote when it comes to making decisions in the Council, and will operate on a mandate. There is no discussion in the Lisbon treaty, or in any of the surrounding documentation, of direct elections for the position. The right hon. Gentleman has put up a straw man and knocked him down.
	We were given a far more realistic and positive picture of the president's role by the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) and my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty). They both understood that the role of the full-time president broadly reflects the functions that the presidency already performs. The full-time president will chair the European Council, drive forward its work, ensure its preparation and continuity on the basis of the work of the General Affairs and External Relations Council, and facilitate cohesion and consensus. The current twice-yearly rotation causes problems with continuity, as anyone who has ever been involved with Europe will know.
	The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire asked about the interrelationship between the president of the European Council and the new high representative. The treaty makes it clear that the full-time president will perform his or her representational responsibilities at his or her level, and without prejudice to the powers of the high representative of the Union for foreign affairs and security policy. There is provision for two quite distinct roles. The high representative will chair meetings of the Foreign Affairs Council.

William Cash: I am glad to have the opportunity to start the debate. It has already been covered to some extent by our discussions on the general principles. We now have the opportunity to consider the specific questions through amendments. Of course, that is what we should really have been doing all afternoon, but that battle has now been conceded as far as the Government are concerned.
	The meeting in Laeken in December 2001 said, among many other things, that the question at issue was:
	"A better division and definition of competence in the European Union".
	The reality is that these arrangements are extending competence, despite what we heard from the Deputy Leader of the House in her winding-up speech, when she seemed to be suggesting that the treaty was simply a repetition of existing competences. That is not the case. I accuse the Government of a form of appeasement in relation to such questions. Despite their objections to those arrangements, which were expressed in the Convention and on a number of occasions, they have allowed the European Union to go ahead after all.
	In reference to the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), I suggested in an intervention on my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) that we needed a list of the provisions. I asked the Minister to give me a list of those matters where the European Union was being given new powers and to demonstrate the extent to which areas were left to our national Parliament and our voters. That is the key question. Of course, he could not answer it; he gave me a few examples, such as defence and foreign policy. However, in terms of the range of matters that are being taken over by the European Union under the treaty and the accumulated functions that have been generated by the secret negotiations, we in this Parliament are increasingly like the smile on the face of the Cheshire cat. Bit by bit, we are vanishing into a vacuum that is being enlarged by the EU.
	The EU is centralising, and I believe that the effect of that, curiously and ironically, will be increased tensions in the EU. That is exactly the opposite of what it is seeking to achieve. It will claim that it is trying to introduce greater harmonisation, greater peace and greater stability as a result of the consolidating functions. I firmly believe that what is happening will generate more tension and less harmony as the member states jostle, through the general elections in their respective countries, to try to maintain the respect of their voters and their electorate, who will demand things that they cannot be given.
	The one thing that the treaty does by centralising and by increasing the exclusive and shared competences is diminish the room within which the respective national Parliaments can legislate. The voters will come up against their Parliament's inability to respond to their wishes—the Parliaments will simply have to turn around and say, "We cannot legislate in this field because it has been handed over to the European Union, which, as we know, is remote, bureaucratic and undemocratic." When that happens, the tensions in the member states will tend to increase.
	With the potential for problems with running the economy, an increasing possibility of higher unemployment, the failure of the Lisbon agenda and the difficulties of matching people's aspirations—which is inconsistent with the Laeken declaration's words about being closer to the citizen—a vacuum is being created. No one seems to realise that in the pursuit of those abstract ideologies, the seeds of the destruction of the EU are being sown. The people will not stand for it when things go wrong.
	Another problem is that because the acquis is set in concrete and cannot really be amended except through a formula such as that which I shall develop tomorrow in relation to new clauses 8 and 9, which I understand have been selected, there is no way in which the powers can be repatriated unless individual member states are prepared to take unilateral action and to get it right after proper negotiation. I do not believe in unilateral action without discussion or negotiation.
	The parliamentary channel is the only place where these matters are being discussed. I know that as I speak, what I am saying is going out live on the parliamentary channel.

William Cash: The problem is that it is all part of the process of greater integration, with more centralisation and less democracy. The European Parliament is involved in certain areas of co-decision, but that only serves to lock down and contain member states' national parliaments. We are in the ridiculous situation of being invited to congratulate the EU on allowing national parliaments to be involved. General elections take place on a national basis, but the process of making laws is being handed over to the undemocratic procedure that I have set out.
	That is the system in which we are effectively imprisoned. I believe that we should have the guts to make sure that we remedy the problem but, in the absence of a "get out of jail" card such as I propose in new clauses 8 and 9, which we will debate tomorrow, we will not be able to repatriate effectively the powers that have been taken from us.
	I do not want to go into detail now, as there will be ample opportunity tomorrow, but the real question has to do with how we can ensure that this Chamber is maintained as the centre of gravity of power in our legislative process. The danger is that that power will be exerted by external agencies such as the European Commission, or that it will be expressed through regulation that does not require legislation in this House. Another possibility is that legislative power in Europe will be expressed through directives, which means that we will be left to implement the legislation that is passed in our own fashion.
	As I said in an intervention earlier on my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks, the word "competence" is a euphemism for power. Power is about authority, and governance. I used the word "appeasement" earlier in respect of the Government's policy, and it applies exactly to what they are doing. They have given in to the systems and fashions of the European Commission and the eurocracy in a way that is nothing short of appeasement.
	The Government did not have to give in. I remember the former Prime Minister saying, "Let battle be joined!" I think that I had a little to do with his granting of a first referendum, as I had pointed out the constitutional nature of the repeal process that was taking place. The ESC has said that this treaty is substantially the same as the previous constitutional proposals, but the Government have given in at the first whiff of grapeshot and decided that we will not have a referendum on it.
	There has been all sorts of farcical business from the Liberal Democrats today. I was here and I watched it all. They are pumping out press releases all over the media, but they are just absurd. They want a referendum in order to say yes—I have never heard such rubbish in all my life! They want a referendum because they are totally committed to the integration process.

William Cash: The hon. Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew) says, "Just say no!" However, if I were to follow Baroness Thatcher, I would say, "No, no, no!" That is the point, and the Liberal Democrats have achieved nothing this afternoon other than to make themselves look ridiculous.

Iain Duncan Smith: I should like to draw my hon. Friend back, I hope not too rudely, to his amendments, and to the point about subsidiarity and how it will play out. We discovered back at Maastricht—it has not really changed—that the concept of subsidiarity is completely alien to how we view our democracy. When it was being sold to us by the then Prime Minister, John Major, as a real breakthrough, none of the other countries translated subsidiarity in the same way. It is a peculiar continental concept that says that where power rests with those at the top, they will give back what they like to those down below. In this country, power is supposed to rest with the people, and we are only meant to borrow it. That has made the difference in how that concept has been interpreted. When Labour Members make ludicrous arguments about subsidiarity, they should read the debates; then they would realise that subsidiarity has used been in exactly the same way, and it has done absolutely nothing to return a jot of power to the nation states or the people.

Mike Gapes: In the last intervention there was reference to the Maastricht treaty; the hon. Gentleman somehow omitted that treaty in his list of great battles of fundamental importance. Is that because he thinks that it is less significant than the Lisbon treaty, or does he agree with the denunciation that the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith) made of the former Prime Minister, John Major, and with all those, including his Front-Bench colleagues, who voted for the Maastricht treaty?

William Cash: The only reason why I did not mention Maastricht was modesty, if I may say so. I did not think that it was necessary for me to explain every detail, as I tabled 150 amendments to that treaty. The number of amendments that I have tabled to the Lisbon treaty is of the same order, or a little greater. That is why I find myself leading on this group of amendments. I happen to believe that the Maastricht treaty was one of the critical moments in our history. The BBC recognised that point in a debate that took place reasonably recently. The bottom line is that although Maastricht was enormously important, the treaty that we are considering is even more important; the accumulation of functions since Maastricht has merely demonstrated that we were right at the time. That accumulation is in line with the predictions that we made at the time; that is the point.
	Article F of the treaty of European union says that
	"The Union shall respect the national identities of its Member States".
	The Lisbon treaty, too, refers to a "respect" for
	"regional and local self-government".
	That is completely misleading. The Union approach has been to pursue a one-size-fits-all policy, with total disregard for national identities, so the extension of the competences actually works in exactly the reverse manner. Moreover, the treaty says that the Union "shall respect" nation states'
	"essential State functions, including ensuring the territorial integrity of the State, maintaining law and order and safeguarding national security."
	In fact, although national security remains the sole responsibility of each member state, the article does not include important state functions such as conducting a foreign and security policy. Police and judicial co-operation will cease to be intergovernmental, and will be placed under the Community method.
	It is very likely that the Union will put forward measures that might jeopardise member states' national security measures. The evidence is contained in the Prüm treaty relating to the collection of personal data, which is being implemented into Union law, so there is a kind of convergence. National security is hugely important, but there are indications of an invasion of it by other means. If we agree to the amendment, we will revert to the status quo, and we will therefore get rid of the problem and retain national security at the heart of our arrangements. I shall give that matter further thought as the debate progresses.
	The principle of sincere co-operation is not new. Article 11 of the treaty on European union states that
	"The Member States shall support the Union's external and security policy actively and unreservedly in a spirit of loyalty and mutual solidarity."
	The treaty operates by reducing in every respect the power of our Parliament, and therefore the rights of our voters.
	The position on subsidiarity is simply this: a series of laws are incorporated in the treaty, and the European institutions' attempt to put a gloss on the matter by suggesting that subsidiarity will resolve the problem and to give so-called power to national Parliaments is a complete con trick. That has not happened to any effect on any occasion that I can think of. Subsidiarity does not work, and there is no intention that it should. It is part and parcel of the artificiality of the arguments that they put forward to try to demonstrate that they are giving some credibility to national Parliaments.
	I turn to competences and the European Court of Justice. As I say, competences are about power and law making. The ECJ is about the interpretation of that law. Let me quote the opinion of the Council legal service of 22 June 2007 on the primacy of European law. I suggest that my Front-Bench colleagues listen to this, although I am sure that they will anyway. The opinion says:
	"It results from the case-law of the Court of Justice that primacy of EC law is a cornerstone principle of Community law. According to the Court"—
	please note that it is "According to the Court"—
	"this principle is inherent to the specific nature of the European Community."
	There follows mention of the Costa case of 1964, to which the Minister for Europe referred earlier.
	The opinion of the Council legal service goes on to say that at that time
	"there was no mention of primacy in the treaty. It is still the case today. The fact that the principle of primacy will not be included in the future treaty shall not in any way change the existence of the principle and the existing case-law of the Court of Justice."
	The opinion continues:
	"It follows . . . that the law stemming from the treaty, an independent source of law, could not, because of its special and original nature, be overridden by domestic legal provisions, however framed, without being deprived of its character as Community law and without the legal basis of the Community itself being called into question."
	There is only one way to get past that judgment by the Council legal service, which is right in one sense only—that that is the assertion made by the European institutions within the framework of the competences that they have granted themselves and have been granted, foolishly, by member states. As that is the basis on which they operate, we cannot and must not allow our own Parliament to assume that what they say is right. We must insert a provision, which I will discuss tomorrow, about the preservation of the supremacy of the United Kingdom Parliament, having regard to the European Communities Act 1972.
	I will not go further down that route this evening, however much I may be tempted to do so—which I am. Having resisted that temptation, I shall briefly refer to the other amendments that I tabled. I have already dealt with many of the matters in general terms; they include, for example, the fact that Community common policies will take precedence because of exclusive competences that are being granted; the problems that we have with respect to competition rules; the conservation of marine biological resources; and the common commercial policy. I mentioned yesterday the problems that arise in the context of the development of policy. These demonstrate the manner in which the Union will grab and maintain new areas of exclusive competence. These matters are dealt with under my amendment No. 121.
	There is also the matter of the UK Parliament being required to legally submit to the Union if and when the Union acts first. That also arise under amendment No. 121. The United Kingdom would be required to conduct economic policy in the interests of the European Union under instruction of the Council—again, that is dealt with in amendment No. 121. The European Union seeks to direct policy for British industry, health, education, sport, culture, civil protection and tourism. That, too, is covered by amendment No. 121.
	Then there is the issue of the European Court of Justice and its ruling—not its guidance and interpretation, but its ultimate jurisdiction over the right of the British people to make their choices in general elections. That is what is taken away by giving such enormous power to the European Court of Justice.
	The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) will speak about fisheries policy. There are further issues such as the granting of aid, the common agricultural policy and so on. The bottom line is that we are giving in to the whole of the European Union without—

Mike Gapes: In the United Nations system, there is, of course, no democratic parliamentary body of a global form. We have the parliamentary network for the World Bank. We have various parliamentary bodies, but they are not real parliaments. The European Parliament is a parliament that has real, and increasing, powers.
	Under the terms of the Lisbon treaty, European legislation will be submitted for a process of dual approval, in equal terms, by the Council, which represents the member states and is composed of Ministers from the democratically elected Governments, who are accountable to their national Parliaments, and by the directly elected Members of the European Parliament, who come from the different political groupings and different countries. It is a dual process of accountability to directly elected Members of the European Parliament and to indirectly appointed Ministers who are indirectly accountable to their national Parliaments. The dilemma for those of us in national Parliaments has always been the inability to get to grips with the accountability of our Ministers when they have gone from our national Parliament to a supernatural body—I mean supranational— [ Interruption. ] It would be if the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green had his way; of course, those who live on other planets do believe the same thing.
	There is a need for much greater accountability, and in many ways we are still grappling with that in our own Parliament. When the Foreign Affairs Committee or the European Scrutiny Committee consider these issues, we are frustrated about how Ministers can be properly accountable to this House in our scrutiny of European legislation and in respect of dealing with these matters when they go to meetings of the Council of Ministers. The situation is not satisfactory at present. The current arrangements do not work well, and we must find ways to improve them.
	The directly elected European Parliament also has an important role. The prior scrutiny of national Parliaments must be reinforced by a change whereby we receive all European legislative proposals directly, in good time, so that we are able to discuss them with Ministers prior to the adoption of common European positions within the EU Council and not, as at the moment, in a rather inadequate way.

Mike Gapes: What it tells us is that last year the German presidency took through a procedure for bringing the draft mandate before the intergovernmental conference, which, as the Foreign Affairs Committee said, was not sufficiently accountable to national Parliaments or to the European Parliament. That process was inadequate; it was not sufficiently transparent, and we said so in our report. That does not in any way negate my point, which concerns the need then, now and in the future for greater parliamentary accountability. The problem with Conservative Members' position is that they want greater parliamentary accountability in theory, but in practice, they would remove one of the legs of that process—accountability of the European Parliament.

Mike Gapes: The current situation with regard to international treaties is that the Government signs the treaty, and after the event, Parliament is informed that the Government have signed the treaty. We do not have the system that some Scandinavian countries, such as Denmark, have, where Parliament is involved in that process at an earlier stage. I am not sure what the hon. Lady is arguing. Is she happy with the current situation and just wishes to—

Mike Gapes: We are debating the Lisbon treaty, yes, but it has already been signed. If the hon. Lady is saying that the current situation is not satisfactory, I agree. It would be great if the Foreign Affairs Committee and other Select Committees were able to conduct prior scrutiny of international treaties, instead of there being a one-and-a-half-hour debate on a statutory instrument, or some other mechanism under which prior scrutiny does not happen. There are important proposals in the treaty that should be adopted and supported.
	I referred to qualified majority voting, and I shall briefly move on to one or two other areas.
	The annual budgetary procedure will require the Council and the European Parliament to approve all European Union expenditure, which changes the current arrangement, whereby agricultural spending, which has historically accounted for the majority of European Union spending, is ring-fenced and separate. Previously, there was the own resources spending addition and inadequacy in the European Community's dealing with the agricultural spend, but at last, for the first time, we have proper parliamentary accountability for that, which is important.
	The Commission is and has been far more powerful than it will be. A new system of supervision by the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers will enable either institution to block decisions on delegated legislation to which they object. The treaty gives the European Parliament and the Council the right to revoke the delegation of powers. Again, it restricts the Commission's powers.
	The President of the Commission will be elected on a proposal from the European Council but by the European Parliament, taking into account elections to it. That clearly means greater accountability in the choice of President, whoever that person may be.
	As we know from our previous debates on the foreign policy aspects of the treaty, the high representative for foreign and security policy will be accountable to member states through the Council and, as a member of the Commission, subject to questioning and scrutiny in the European Parliament. Again, that means more accountability and scrutiny than currently exist.
	How do we assess the overall consequences of the proposals? I referred at the beginning to two aspects: more democracy and greater effectiveness. The European Union will become more effective by adopting the Lisbon treaty. I accept that matters that Governments, meeting in Council, decide through qualified majority voting will increase. However, in an organisation of 27, including some very small countries, one has to have a mechanism whereby decisions can be made so that the organisation is effective. If we do not do that, Luxembourg could, for example, stop moves to examine specific financial issues in the EU single market. Tobacco producers in Greece could lobby effectively to stop reform of the common agricultural policy. Some countries could prevent measures to increase co-operation on climate change, general environmental policy or energy policy simply because of some small national interest— [Interruption.] I refer to a small national interest that would be contrary to the interests of the larger states, including ours.  [Interruption.]

Mike Gapes: I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman has misunderstood, so I will repeat myself for his benefit. The move towards more qualified majority voting in those areas where it is necessary is in our national interest, because that is where we will be in the mainstream and able to secure the reforms that are needed in the European Union to deal with globalisation and the other challenges that we face. However, there are also important safeguards. In those areas where the process is not necessary, such as foreign and defence policy, we retain the entirely intergovernmental decision-making arrangements.
	It is therefore necessary to support the treaty, because it is in our national interests. It gives us an increased share of the vote, reduces the size of the Commission, gets rid of inefficiencies and duplications, gets rid of the external affairs Commissioner, and replaces two jobs with in foreign policy. The treaty also means that the way the European Union institutions work is more accountable to both national Parliaments and the European Parliament.

Mike Gapes: I hope that the House will reject the amendment and vote, as it did on the Maastricht treaty, to support the Lisbon treaty.

Alex Salmond: I happily accept the endorsement of the wonderful work of the Scottish fisheries Minister, Richard Lochhead. May I ask the hon. Lady about Elspeth Attwooll, a distinguished Liberal MEP, who on 24 November 2004 supported a motion saying that the fisheries committee
	"considers that, within the context of the often exclusive competences of the EU which are detailed in the draft Constitution, the inclusion of the conservation of marine biological resources is anomalous and unjustified".
	When did the Liberal Democrats change their mind, and why?

Jo Swinson: The right hon. Gentleman quotes from a European Parliament document issued three years ago, but the Liberal Democrat position is incredibly clear. Exclusive competence is currently set out in EU legislation, and the right hon. Gentleman should recognise that, as I have already said, even if his amendment were passed tonight, nothing would change. This is pure political posturing by the right hon. Gentleman's party.
	With that, Mrs. Heal, I would now like to let other Members speak, but I am afraid that I will not be able to support these amendments.

Austin Mitchell: It is delightful to rise after the hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) has roused the House to a sufficient crescendo of excitement to allow me to introduce my amendments, although they have already been denounced in a rather long speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford, South (Mike Gapes) before I have had the chance to put my case before the House. It was effectively argued that to come out of the common fisheries policy is to come out of Europe. That is supposed to be what is really behind the amendment, but what nonsense my hon. Friend spoke.
	I wish to speak to my amendment No. 225, which the cream of the Labour party support. It is designed not to withdraw from Europe, but to add to the exclusions from the treaty of Lisbon, which the Government have decided to accept on common foreign and security policy, the Council's powers on a proposal from the Commission to adopt
	"measures on fixing prices, levies, aid and quantitative limitations and on the fixing and allocation of fishing opportunities".
	The amendment would remove that provision from the treaty.
	In other words, the amendment knocks down the basis and the worst parts of the common fisheries policy. Those worst parts are seen in the treaty powers on the fixing and allocation of fishing opportunities. In Europe, of course, they are fixed and allocated by quotas. The North sea and areas around the British coast comprise mixed fisheries where quotas inevitably lead to discards. If a vessel catches a fish that it has no quota for, it simply dumps it back in the sea. It effectively kills it, making no contribution to conservation. It is a ruinous system. The smaller the quotas become, the greater the discards become. It is an automatic process. My amendment would knock out that provision, thus eliminating the discards problem.
	The amendment would also knock out the power to give aid. Although that power has not given much aid to the fishing industry in this country, it has given massive amounts, financed by our contributions, to countries such as Spain—enabling it to rebuild and re-equip a fleet that is already far too large, and to use it to fish our waters for our stocks and loot the grounds of developing nations—and Morocco, where the Community buys, with our money, quotas for the Spanish fleet to catch, usually smashing up local boats and ruining local stocks in the process.
	The other powers that the amendment would remove have made the common fisheries policy undoubtedly the worst fisheries policy in the world. I can think of no fisheries policy that is worse than the common fisheries policy, which has decimated stocks all around the British coast, especially in the North sea. It should be struck out. It is amazing how few people want it. I have heard no one support it, apart from the occasional Liberal Democrat. We have just heard one speak in favour of it.

Austin Mitchell: That raises the question of the Liberal Democrats' proposals for a referendum. Incidentally, if those proposals were applied to Scotland they would require a referendum not on devolution, but on the 1707 treaty of Union. But the question to ask about the common fisheries policy is "Does the Liberal Democratic party support it, as a whole, or does it not?"

Austin Mitchell: There is a word called yes and there is a word called no. Which would the hon. Lady use in this context? Will she tell us? Very well: she cannot tell us whether the Liberal Democratic party supports the common fisheries policy or not. In any event, very few people want it, and only those Liberal Democrats who say yes—which presumably includes the hon. Lady—support it.
	All my hon. Friends regard the common fisheries policy as a disaster. They are all embarrassed by it, and they all want to change it. However, they tend to view it as part of the package. If you like Europe, you must like the common fisheries policy. Well, my amendment allows them to dissociate themselves from it and to say "We like Europe and we will accept the treaty, but we are going to exclude the common fisheries policy." That is the sensible thing to do. It gives us a real power to choose. It is not necessarily part of the package: it can be taken out, and it would be taken out by my amendment.
	However, I tabled the amendment not just to knock out the faults in the treaty that I have enumerated, but to prevent the coping stone of the words in the treaty from being incorporated in the arch of the common fisheries policy. I intended to prevent a rather messy, anomalous policy, which no one likes but everyone feels obliged to support for different reasons, from being a requirement of the treaty. If we ratify the treaty unamended, the common fisheries policy will remain as an essential policy, sanctified and upheld by the treaty, from which we cannot deviate. That policy should not be part of the structure. Indeed, it was only fiddled into the structure by means of a very devious approach. There was no fisheries policy in the treaty of Rome, the founding document of the European Union—it simply was not mentioned. That treaty provides for a common market in respect of trade in agricultural products including, it is stated, the products of fisheries, or fish. There is nothing about a policy of controlling catches, regulating quotas and providing aid for vessels, or about what species can or cannot be caught. All that is mentioned is internal trade in fish. That is how the arrangement rested from 1956 until 1970, which is a long time not to have a policy.
	Then Britain entered negotiations to join the Common Market, as did Norway. Those nations had among the richest fishing grounds in the world, and certainly the two richest fishing grounds in the Common Market if they were to enter it. It was therefore thought necessary to cobble together a policy to get access to the fishing grounds of Britain and Norway. Negotiations started in June 1970, and they quickly resulted not in a policy, but in a statement that there should be equal access to a common resource. That was all that there was to the basis of the so-called common fisheries policy—just equal access. European vessels would have equal access to our fishing grounds and those of Norway, and to all our waters.
	That was in fact a negotiating gambit, not a sine qua non, but Edward Heath took it to be compulsory. He thought that that proposal had to be accepted if he was going to get entry to the Common Market, and he was desperate to get entry because he had no other strategy. Therefore, he regarded fisheries in the way set out in the documents in Scotland. I ask the right hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) to remind me of the phrase.

Austin Mitchell: Expendable: that is what the fishing industry was in 1970. The shameful policy of equal access to a common resource was put together, regardless of the interests of fishing, and particularly those of the inshore fishermen who opposed the whole business—the distant-water fishermen were making rich catches in Iceland at the time, so they did not care much and were not bothered about European or British waters. Effectively, the interests of the British and Norwegian fishermen were expendable under this system. Therefore, without an attempt to renegotiate it and to say that it could not be part of the treaty, and without an attempt to say we must make other provisions when we extended our territorial limits, the Prime Minister at the time, Edward Heath, shamefully accepted the common fisheries policy. Geoffrey Rippon, then a Minister, told the House that these were just transitional arrangements that automatically ceased at the end of a fixed period. That is what he said. Lady Tweedsmuir in the Lords got it slightly wrong, because she assured the other place that the whole business would be renegotiated in 1892; but although she was 100 years out, she too indicated that it would be renegotiated. On the basis of that, we accepted the common fisheries policy and Ted Heath sold the fishing industry down the river, as the fishing industry saw it at the time and has seen it ever since. Norway did not accept that, and it stayed out for that very reason—it had no intention of being sold down the river.
	Because the common fisheries policy was not really a policy at all, it had subsequently to be written into the Maastricht treaty to give it a post hoc legal basis. That was done: an attempt was made to put it on a legal basis by writing it into the treaty. That was then taken further by Giscard D'Estaing's abortive constitution. The British Government had not had the guts or the gumption to challenge its legality. It is clear, however, that the Commission was worried about that legality, which is why it got the policy written into the Maastricht treaty and tried to write it in further in the constitution.
	The constitution stated that it would give the Commission exclusive competence of
	"the conservation of marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy".
	That was an historic first: it was the first time that fish were included in any constitution and it was the first time that marine biological resources, which presumably include seaweed, dolphins and presumably anything that goes into marine areas, were included as a crucial part or arch of a constitution. I suggested at the time that had the provision been written in some of the magnificent language of the American constitution, it would have said, "We, the marine biological resources and fish of the Union, regard these truths to be self-evident. We are a common resource and may be caught by any country. That is a basic right for us and for them."
	The wording from the constitution has just been transferred into the treaty of Lisbon; it is almost identical. The Government tell us that it is a treaty and not a constitution. I believe them implicitly to be wrong, because it is de facto a constitution—it defines the way in which the European Union will work. Writing provisions into the treaty is more effective than entrenching them in a constitution, because a constitution with entrenched rights will need some way to dig those rights in and ensure that they cannot suddenly be reversed by a small majority in the House of Commons. That does not need to be done with a treaty because once provisions are in a treaty they are entrenched for ever. They can be modified or removed only by another treaty, which must have the support of 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 or 33 member states—however many are in the Union at the time. That approach is more effective than constitutional entrenchment, and it is the one that we are taking if we allow the current words to remain in the treaty of Lisbon.

Austin Mitchell: I think that the occupants of Treasury Bench find it difficult to defend the interests of the British fishing industry, because each time a fisheries Minister goes to a negotiation in December, the Government have other fish to fry. They might want a concession on this or to move forward on that, and the fishing industry is always expendable. It is always the area where the Government can make concessions and improve relations with Europe to secure a gain in another direction. That is the sort of process that goes on. Fishing is never regarded as a front-line interest and something to be defended. [Interruption.] Fishing is an important industry that makes a contribution to the national economy, so it is irresponsible of hon. Members to giggle at the mention of fishing as being important. They presumably support the inclusion of fish in the constitution and they then laugh at them—the poor fish. That is a cruel approach to take to a vital national resource.
	If provisions are entrenched in the way that I have described, we would be lumbered for ever with a common fisheries policy that is not working. It has not protected the stocks and it has ruined the British fishing industry, because that industry has never been allowed to rebuild behind its own waters, which should be behind the 200-mile or median line. Every other country has managed to do that. I look at the prosperous industries that have been built up in New Zealand, Norway, Iceland, the United States and Canada. Those are examples of fishing industries that have been rebuilt behind limits, because only nation states have an interest in conserving their own stock to hand on to the next generation of fishermen. They do not want just to loot them as an expendable resource—

David Borrow: At the beginning of my hon. Friend's contribution, he said that his amendments were ones that people who supported the treaty and the European Union could vote for, because they would repatriate powers relating to the common fisheries policy, if we thought that that was important. As a pro-European who is broadly in favour of the treaty, I am somewhat tempted by his argument. I am also aware that were that to happen, we would need to renegotiate the treaty to ensure that that clause was included when we approve the treaty, which may happen next year. How confident is my hon. Friend that other member states would go along with that?

Austin Mitchell: I am grateful for my hon. Friend's support, although I am doubtful about his querulous fears about what would ensue if my amendments were passed. They would just delete the common fisheries policy. We would be saying that that was no longer a central policy of the European Union, no longer part of the constitution and no longer an issue that has to be dictated from Brussels. We would be saying that we could replace it with either a national policy, which I would prefer, or with agreements between the coastal states that actually fish in the waters concerned, rather than allowing a whole host of vessels in from areas that have no interest in those waters except catching the fish and getting it home as quickly as possible.
	The amendments would open the way to change, and should therefore have wider support. Certainly the common fisheries policy has prevented the British fishing industry from rebuilding in the way in which it would logically have done after it lost Iceland's waters—by concentrating on our own territorial waters and rebuilding fishing there. At the moment we cannot do that because our waters are open to access by other vessels. Only the nation state has the interest in its own territorial waters, but we could come to agreements with other states on exchanges of catches or quotas. The point is that we would decide our own policy, instead of having it imposed on it by agreements from Brussels that involve other nations with no interest in fishing or in our fishing stocks. That would also contribute to a more sensible common fisheries policy.
	We all want to see the European Union widened. I want to see it become wider and shallower, not wider and deeper. It would be desirable, for example, to bring in countries such as Iceland and Norway. We could never bring those countries into the European Union at the moment because fishing is crucial to them—far more crucial than it is to us. They cannot allow access to their fishing grounds on the scale that would be required by the Common Market and by Europe. That stopped the Norwegians from entering in 1972 and stopped them from adhering in a subsequent referendum. It certainly keeps out Iceland. There can be no way of broadening Europe by bringing in those nations as long as we keep the common fisheries policy, because that would mean that every country would want access to those nations' fishing resources. They would be insane to allow that.
	Let me conclude by pointing out that the policy has not worked and is not working. It is time for us to end it, and amendment No. 225 provides us with the opportunity to do so. I hope for a vote, although of course that is at your discretion, Mrs. Heal. My tellers are ready, my troops are armed and I think that the amendment is a rather better way of dealing with the issue than amendment No. 222. I hope that we can have a vote on it.

Bill Wiggin: I rise to support amendment No. 222. Ministers and bureaucrats in Brussels may well argue that the treaty is merely putting into words what is happening in practice. Indeed, we heard that from the Deputy Leader of the House when she summed up earlier. In previous written answers about the constitution, Ministers have stated:
	"Existing Community competence over marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy derives from article 102 of the UK treaty of accession."—[ Official Report, 2 March 2005; Vol. 431, c. 1159W.]
	No other treaty is this explicit, however, about taking away member states' powers over their marine environment and biological resources. It is certainly not that clear or explicit in article 102 of the accession treaty, which states:
	"the Council, acting on a proposal from the Commission, shall determine conditions for fishing with a view to ensuring protection of the fishing grounds and conservation of the biological resources of the sea."
	I recognise that the legal arguments on the extent to which the article divides responsibility for fisheries between Europe and the UK have been raging for years. However, instead of taking the opportunity to clarify the arrangements and set clear red lines, enshrined in a treaty, the Government have stood back and are letting it slip away. Action to defend British interests could have been taken earlier, because the dangers had been recognised by the European Parliament, scientists and Labour MPs. Even the Government expressed concern over exclusive competence.
	When pressed in the European Scrutiny Committee by the hon. Member for Moray (Angus Robertson) on whether the UK Government were happy to see marine resources as an exclusive competence of the EU, the former Minister, the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), stated:
	"No, we are looking at this."
	Perhaps his mum wrote that bit; I do not know. Brussels tried to take more powers from the nation state in the marine strategy directive. During the European Standing Committee debate on that subject two years ago, the former Minister responsible, the hon. Member for Exeter (Mr. Bradshaw), said:
	"One thing that we are worried about, as I have said, is that the draft directive appears to be a power grab by the Commission in terms of competences and what could or could not be done. That is completely unacceptable."—[ Official Report, European Standing Committee, 14 February 2006; c. 7.]
	In the Lisbon Treaty, however, the Government are prepared to hand over, perhaps once and for all, exclusive competence over our marine biological resources. That is widely regarded as unnecessary and will not bring benefits to our marine environment.
	The European Parliament's Committee on Fisheries has dismissed the proposed power grab, voting against it, stating:
	"within the context of the other exclusive competencies of the EU which are detailed in the draft Constitution, the inclusion of the conservation of marine biological resources is anomalous and unjustified."
	I think that the quotation given earlier was the same, and it is very helpful. The committee expressed further concern
	"at the attribution of exclusive competence for the 'conservation of marine biological resources' under Article 12 of the 'constitutional treaty'...since it will tend to marginalise the competence of national and regional authorities which have in the past succeeded in preserving resources which are now under threat and whose protection is sought."
	We also hear Ministers talk about taking a science-based approach to the marine environment, but that can have no credibility when they ignore the Royal Society of Edinburgh's recommendation that
	"Ministers should reconsider their position over the EU exclusive competence for the conservation of marine biological resources, with a view to getting this deleted from the proposed EU constitution so that the principle of subsidiarity may apply to fisheries, as it does to other matters."
	The same report also recommended that Ministers should endeavour
	"to have the existing 12-mile limits made permanent instead of being subject to renewal every ten years."
	That is something that the Lisbon treaty would put in jeopardy.
	The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) chairs Labour's Euro-Safeguards campaign. In an article in his weblog, he notes the change from common fisheries policy to "exclusive competence" over the
	"marine biological resources of the sea".
	He goes on:
	"We are told that most of the Constitution is already in earlier treaties. Much isn't and it also builds new powers on the back of earlier provisions...These and many other major changes are being presented as tinkering and 'tidying up', too unimportant for Parliament to discuss. This legislative confidence trick is unworthy of a government which should listen to the views of Parliament and people and allow full and free debate in Parliament before any referendum or surrender of parliamentary sovereignty or British laws and freedom. You can't win wholehearted consent by confidence tricks, half truths and closing down debate."
	The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I have read his articles in  The House Magazine, and I hope that I have not got him in trouble with Tommy the Whip or his wife—whichever he is more frightened of. However, I liked what he said earlier, and I apologise if I have got him into a pickle. He is right to say that we should co-operate with our European partners in improving the overall health of the marine environment and fish stocks, when possible—but the provisions in the treaty, left unamended and in their entirety, go much further.
	When the Environment Secretary was asked in a written question what the effect of the proposed change would be, the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Jonathan Shaw), decided to defer the answer to a later date. If there is to be no change, or if the proposed changes were merely "tidying-up" exercises, why are Ministers unable to respond to what is essentially a straightforward question?
	We need clarification of the responsibilities of the nation state and the European Union. The provisions in the treaty do not do that; instead, they potentially leave the door open to further powers being slowly sucked away from Britain by directives, regulations, European judges, and stealth.
	One of the biggest problems with the EU and the CFP has been discarding, as the hon. Member for Great Grimsby noted earlier. Under the strict total allowable catch regime, it is estimated that between 40 and 60 per cent. of fish caught are thrown back into the sea, dead. Discard rates for the UK fisheries are high. The discard rate for North sea cod caught by English and Welsh vessels in the North sea stood at 43.8 per cent. in the last three months of 2006. Between April and June 2006, 42.2 per cent. of west of Scotland haddock was discarded by Scottish vessels. In total, 62.7 per cent. of west of Scotland saithe and 83.5 per cent. of west of Scotland whiting were discarded by Scottish vessels between July and September 2006. That means that a total of 246.3 tonnes of fish was discarded, but only 48.6 tonnes were landed—or that about 5 tonnes of fish were discarded for every tonne landed. That cannot go on.
	Such data are collected and sent to the Commission by this country, but other countries, notably France and Spain, do not provide the necessary information. Moreover, the European Commission does not appear to be taking action against those countries, and its discard atlas appears to have been kicked into the long grass.
	So what is the point of the EU wanting to give itself "exclusive competence" over
	"the conservation of marine biological resources under the Common Fisheries Policy"
	when it is not taking adequate responsibility for its existing powers and authority? Europe has got to get to grips with tackling discarding: under this treaty, that position will not change, and it could be made worse.
	Nor will this treaty guarantee greater fairness for our fishermen. For example, we have seen the Commission penalise British crews for over-fishing herring and mackerel, and subsequently they have had to "pay back" the extra fish over five years. Yet the French over-fished bluefin tuna—which is an endangered species—by 40 per cent. in 2005 and by 30 per cent. in 2006, and the Commission did nothing except waive EU penalties and negotiate an international amnesty.
	That is not providing adequate protection to marine biological resources. The opportunity to improve the management of fish stocks and the marine environment has been wasted. More powers will go to Brussels; it is enshrined in the treaty. The Government have ignored the Opposition, Labour MPs, the European Parliament and scientists. Our marine environment is not in safe hands. The provisions will do nothing to improve the situation. Therefore, we should accept the amendment.

Mark Hendrick: I am sure that many Government members and MEPs would say that, in a good many cases, the reason why accounts are not signed off is not fraud but because the level of detail and the care with which many of the budget lines are spent.
	The Lisbon treaty will mean that all EU legislation will be subject to a level of parliamentary scrutiny not seen before. I have visited a number of legislatures in the European Union, and apart from the Danish legislature—the Folketing—the European Scrutiny Committee here in the House of Commons is probably one of the best means of providing that scrutiny. Under the Lisbon treaty, the Commission will give us sight of proposed legislation for national Parliaments, the European Parliament and the Council long before our Ministers go to Europe and do deals, contrary to what happened in the past. I am a former member of the European Scrutiny Committee, and there have been times when I have questioned members of my Government on the stance and positions that they took. The introduction of the new procedures will allow national parliamentarians to do that with much more ease, as they will be aware of proposed legislation much earlier.
	Democratic control and the exercise of delegated legislation powers by the Commission will be reinforced through a new system of supervision by the European Parliament and the Council. That will enable either of them to block decisions on delegated legislation. That cannot happen at the moment. The Commission can, through delegated legislation, take many decisions that cannot be stopped by the Council or the European Parliament. The treaty will change that situation for the first time.
	MEPs will be given separate votes to approve the President of the European Commission and the college of Commissioners. The European Council, in nominating a Commission president, must strongly take into account the position of the European Parliament, which is a directly elected body.
	On reform, after the 2009 European elections there will be a new MEPs' statute. The statute will reform salaries, providing a standard base across the Union. The standard MEP's salary across Europe will not affect the UK tax system. That will ensure that UK MEPs' net salaries remain equivalent to UK MPs' salaries. The question is whether the new budgetary procedure will enhance Parliament's say on spending. Will it block the budget review? Will it put the UK's rebate at risk? The treaty will expand member states' influence by giving them a greater say on all parts of the budget. Again, that is a move away from intergovernmentalism to give member states more say, as their Parliaments will be able to speak out much more loudly on the budget. It will also enhance member states' say on the overall size of the EU annual budget.
	The distinction will be removed between compulsory expenditure—I have already mentioned agricultural spending—and other areas of expenditure over which the European Parliament has the final say and which is the larger and increasing share of total EU expenditure, for example, expenditure in relation to structural funds, from which my region has benefited greatly. The ceilings on EU expenditure are set by the seven-year financial perspectives. Those multi-annual financial frameworks will continue to be decided strictly by unanimity in the Council.
	The Council, not just the European Parliament, will take decisions on all subjects covered by the budget review. There can be no changes to the UK's budget abatement without the UK's agreement. The Lisbon treaty will not change that.
	We have gone from being a European Parliament that was composed initially of appointed Members on a purely consultative basis to a modern electronic Parliament which, as a result of the treaty, is a legislature that can flex its muscles and which, in many more areas, carries weight equal to that of the Council. We are seeing the development of a Parliament that Europe can be proud of.
	I am proud to be a Member of the House, and I was proud to be a Member of the European Parliament. Having both those Parliaments working well and parliamentarians working hard for the constituents whom they represent is important in bringing power and law-making closer to the people. I see the treaty as a genuine development which moves away from intergovernmentalism and gives the people of Europe more say over the things that affect them.

Angus Robertson: Nations such as Slovakia, Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic and others may have had intermittent maritime histories, but they certainly have none now, and the notion that their Agriculture Ministers—they do not even have Fisheries Ministers—turn up at Council of Ministers meetings and have more say over the Scottish fishing industry than my right hon. Friend the Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond), the First Minister of Scotland, who has responsibilities for fishing in Scotland, shows what nonsense the CFP is.
	I return to the importance of this industry. I may have misinterpreted the laughter earlier, but this is a serious issue for coastal communities. It is about the existence of towns, jobs, their lifeblood, just as it was for those towns that suffered during the miners' strike when people were faced with the closure of their pits and were looking into the black hole of their future. It needs to be understood in urban centres that that is why the CFP is such a controversial policy, and one that needs to be addressed.
	More than 5,000 fishermen are employed around the coast of Scotland, and for every job at sea there are an estimated five more fisheries-dependent jobs onshore. In 2006, £390 million-worth of fish was landed in Scotland, two thirds of the UK total, and Scotland accounts for 70 per cent. of all fish landings into the UK. Ironically, when the Council of Ministers discusses these fisheries, the UK Minister who represents only 30 per cent. of the industry has the lead role over the Scottish Minister who represents 70 per cent. of the industry, another anomalous situation that is unsustainable.

Angus Robertson: The hon. Gentleman does not have the benefit of eyes in the back of his head, which would enable him to see his colleagues on the Labour Benches agreeing with our criticisms of the common fisheries policy. That applies not only to Labour Members in this House but to socialists in the European Parliament, not least in the Fisheries Committee, where there was a vote of 23 to zero—there were four abstentions but no votes against—saying that exclusive competence over fisheries is a bad thing. That is exactly what the SNP amendment would expunge.
	As the hon. Member for Leominster (Bill Wiggin) said, the Royal Society of Edinburgh has sought to encourage us to delete exclusive competences—and not just the Royal Society of Edinburgh, august as it is. All Scottish Members of this House were contacted over the weekend by the Fishermen's Association Ltd, which said:
	"We urge you to stand up in the national interest for our fishing industry and fishing communities.
	While we were disappointed that the UK Government did not make this a red line issue at the time of negotiating the Lisbon Treaty, it is not too late".
	It then asks Members to support the SNP amendment.
	The common fisheries policy is a failed policy. Discards are obscene. The idea that communities are horse-traded in the middle of the night at annual Brussels negotiations is completely unacceptable. The UK Government have failed to address the issue and failed to listen to the Scottish Government. For them, fishing is still expendable. A Conservative Government made a mistake in the early '70s that a Labour Government are repeating now. That is why we will seek to press the amendment to the vote. Members of all parties in this House stood on manifesto or policy commitments to let the people decide on the treaty, and that is what should happen. The SNP has supported a referendum from day one, not least because of the disastrous common fisheries policy.

Michael Lord: Order. The House must not be tempted to have another debate on energy, which we have already dealt with.

Rob Marris: I am grateful for that guidance. Let me say briefly—we are not rehearsing the debate—that my recollection of the treaty is that it refers not to diverting supplies, but to assistance.
	Yesterday, we had a debate on international aid, and previously we had a debate on foreign policy. There is an overlap between those subjects, although they are separate, and that overlap was part of the debate. The idea that those nasty foreigners will tell us what to do on the international stage about aid or foreign policy is completely off the mark. To use the noun that I employed yesterday, the proposals mean "leverage" for the United Kingdom. To use an expression from the earlier debate on foreign policy, they can mean an each-way bet as opposed to a one-way street. If we are alone on an issue, the treaty will allow us to stand alone in terms of the competences, decision making and allocation of powers, because foreign policy has to be held in common and determined by unanimity. If we agree with the other member states, we have leverage.
	When the hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr. Harper) intervened on my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford, South (Mike Gapes) about qualified majority voting and the blocking minority—I intervened subsequently—he presented the position negatively, as if it were always a question of how we could build a blocking minority—the unspoken sentiment in brackets being, "How can we stop those nasty foreigners doing things to the UK?" That is such a negative perspective. We should consider ways in which we can work with other member states when QMV covers the competence to build a coalition to get what we want for our country and our national interests in the European Union.

Rob Marris: My hon. Friend is absolutely right that there is some deepening in the treaty, but had John Major not taken the position that I have described, there would have been either a bust-up of the European Union or a whole lot more deepening.
	Earlier today, the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) talked about constitutional tinkering. I think that "tinkering" was the noun that he used— [Interruption.] It may be a gerund, in fact, I am told. It describes a constant process within a dynamic institution that has expanded greatly in recent years. Many in the House would wish to see it continue to expand. When an organisation expands, it sometimes involves not simply a quantitative change but a qualitative change. With that qualitative change, we need what the right hon. Gentleman referred to as tinkering. We need to change things, and while the treaty perhaps does not get everything to do with the distribution of competences and powers right, it goes a long way towards sorting things out.
	I shall close—[Hon. Members: "Hear, hear!"] There will be more later. I shall close by pointing out that, as some hon. Members know, I spent a lot of my professional life in negotiations. When people negotiate with partners, they often have ongoing relationships, as I did when I was acting for the victims of industrial injuries; I had them with insurance companies, for example, which would come in on one case and then on another the next week. When people have ongoing relationships in negotiations, there has to be give and take. It cannot be a one-way street—take, take, take—which is what the official Opposition seem not to understand about negotiations.

Mark Francois: I begin my response to this group of amendments by briefly making a point about timing. We have debated important issues such as competences and marine biological resources. Unfortunately, however, yet again, because of the Government's business motion, we shall not touch on three other groups of important amendments on the operation of the institutions, on the European Union constitutional and treaty revision issues and on legislative and decision making procedures. Yet again, the Government's business motion has hampered the line-by-line scrutiny of the treaty that we were promised in lieu of a referendum. That needs to be put on the record again tonight.
	I was amazed to hear the hon. Member for Preston (Mr. Hendrick), who is no longer with us, citing the treaty's relationship with the UK abatement as an argument for the treaty. Let me remind the House that, as a result of the Government's miraculous negotiating skills on the abatement—the rebate—they gave away £7 billion of British taxpayers' money and got absolutely nothing in return. If that is one of the strongest arguments in favour of the Lisbon treaty, it is no wonder that the public overwhelmingly want a vote on it.
	I shall now turn to the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr. Cash), whom I congratulate on being selected to lead the group tonight. He started by speaking to amendment No. 82, which seeks to remove replacement article 3A. He knows that I have a slight reservation about the proposal, because it would also remove article 3A(2), which relates to national security. In fairness, he touched on that point in his speech.
	I have a slight reservation about that, but I am much more comfortable about my hon. Friend's amendment No. 121, which seeks to strike out from the treaty the innovations brought into the categories and areas of Union competence. The amendment would improve the treaty by striking out the innovations to the list of the EU's areas of exclusive competence—in other words, the areas in which the EU alone is allowed to legislate—as well as to the list of shared competences, or areas in which the EU, in effect, has first refusal to legislate. The list of exclusive competences has been extended to include areas that would damage the UK's ability to legislate, such as competition policy—the subject of an earlier debate—and marine biological resources, under the common fisheries policy. That is the subject of specific amendments that I shall refer to briefly in a moment.
	Amendment No. 121 would also improve the treaty by striking out from the list of shared competences additions that were opposed by the Government, such as space, trans-European networks and consumer protection. It would also affect fundamentally the nature of the way in which the shared competences are listed in the treaty. It was the Government themselves, in their arguments on the Convention, who made this obvious observation:
	"Shared competences should be a residual category. They should therefore not be listed explicitly. To have an 'indicative list' of some shared competences is the worst of both worlds."
	They were the views of Her Majesty's Government, and we agree with them. To list the categories in this way is, as the Government recognised, bad enough, but as they recognised equally correctly, the way they have been set out is not a restatement of the current position but an enlargement of the EU's powers.
	Amendment No. 121 would also strike out new article 2A, which attempts to set out the rules for the way in which competences are decided. On that point, the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) said in the European Convention, when he was the Minister for Europe:
	"This is an attempt to codify the existing case law and illustrates that to do so may result in oversimplification. So best left for case law. All the caveats that would be required to make this accurate would also make it far too complex for a constitution".
	The caveats that were asked for were not given, yet the rules were not taken out of the constitution and have reappeared in the Lisbon treaty as a result. That is another example of the Government's triumphant negotiating position with regard to Lisbon.
	I should like to say a few words on amendment No. 186, also proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone. The amendment is designed to remove a new replacement article 308, which gives the EU the power to legislate in the following way:
	"If action by the Union should prove necessary, within the framework of the policies defined in the Treaties to attain one of the objectives set out in the Treaties, and the Treaties have not provided the necessary powers, the Council, acting unanimously on a proposal from the Commission and after obtaining the consent of the European parliament, shall adopt the appropriate measures".
	That wording gives rise to an important question, which I know my hon. Friend the Member for Stone will appreciate: who decides whether the action should prove necessary? At best, this wording is, like much of the treaty, ambiguous; at worst, the provision could give the EU a mechanism for legislating outwith the normal channels of legislation. It should not therefore have a place in the treaty.

Mark Francois: If that pleases the Chair, Conservative Members would be delighted to follow my hon. Friend into the Lobby to try to take this pernicious clause out of the treaty.
	Amendments Nos. 222, 225 and 131 deal with marine biological resources and fishing policy. They would improve the treaty by removing the damaging further extension of the EU's powers into marine policy. For instance, the SNP's amendment No. 222 would improve the treaty by striking out from the list of exclusive competences marine and biological resources. We heard a number of very good speeches on that particular topic, not least from the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell), who combined serious points with humour. If I may say so, we heard a passionate speech from the hon. Member for Moray (Angus Robertson). We do not always agree with everything that his party stands for, as he knows, but he made a passionate and convincing speech on this matter tonight, on which I congratulate him. We also heard a very good speech from my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Bill Wiggin), who provided a great deal of detail, not least because he happens to be an expert in this subject.
	The Minister he was assailed from all sides of the House about fishing policy. The House does not support the Government's policy and I look forward to hearing the Minister's attempt to defend it against the criticisms that have been made by Conservative Members, Labour Members and, indeed, by the Scottish National party. In fact, his policy was so bad that it was also criticised by the Liberal Democrats. That is the kind of problem in which the Minister found himself.
	Amendment No. 186 seeks to remove an ambiguous and dangerous provision, and would therefore improve the treaty. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Stone will press it to a vote. Amendment No. 222 seeks to remove a dangerous and unnecessary entrenchment of the EU's competence over marine and biological resources, which could hamper the United Kingdom's ability to manage its own conservation and marine policies. I hope that we shall be given a chance to vote on both those amendments, in defiance of the Government.

Jim Murphy: One of the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Stone attacks an important principle by seeking to remove the following provision in article 3b of the treaty on European Union:
	"Competences not conferred upon the Union in the Treaties remain with the Member States."
	That is an important statement of principle. It clarifies that the EU has only those powers that the member states give it through treaties, and that everything else remains with member states. It sets out the relationship between the EU and member states, making it clear that powers are given to the EU by member states, not the other way around. It makes it clear that member states are the masters of the treaties, as the German constitutional court has put it.
	The duty of sincere co-operation that is reflected here—and which has excited some Opposition Members—is not new. Britain signed up to that when we joined the European Community, and it is also reflected in the Maastricht treaty.
	On the amendments on the categories of competences, the text gives greater clarity than before on what the EU can and cannot do. The treaty also reinforces more than any previous treaty the limits of EU competence, and competences not conferred on the EU remain with member states. The Law Society of England and Wales—not some foreign threat, or part of any great conspiracy—says in its report on the treaty of January this year that:
	"EU law can only be made in those areas in which all EU countries, including the UK, have agreed that it is appropriate for action to be taken at European level."
	It also states:
	"There are five areas in which the UK and other countries have agreed that the EU alone may pass new laws. None of these is new to the Treaty of Lisbon."
	Amendment No. 121 seeks to remove the codification of competences in the treaty. That is a denial of the reality, for the categorisation contained in the Lisbon treaty is not new. It is my strong view that as the treaty has been agreed, the allocation of competences is no longer a one-way street. Just because in the past something was better regulated by the EU than by nation states is not to say that things must remain the same for the next 20, 30 or 40 years, and the treaty makes that clear.
	Amendment No. 222, tabled by the hon. Member for Moray, attacks the inclusion in the treaty of a specific reference to the conservation of marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy being defined as an exclusive EU competence. However, it is an exclusive EU competence, as we knew when we joined the EU. The treaty only confirms that. The Lisbon treaty makes no changes to the extent of the competence at European level on fisheries. Community competence over fisheries is shared, except for conservation measures, which have been exclusive since the UK's treaty of accession. That was confirmed by a European Court of Justice ruling in 1981.

Alex Salmond: As the Minister has alluded, it rests on court decisions—before 1981, specifically on the Kramer case of 1976. In other words, it is secondary community law. The Minister is acceding to put it into a constitutional treaty—to consolidate into a constitutional treaty, as the draft constitution did before it. Why at no stage of any negotiations—such as in the draft constitution or now in the constitutional treaty—did the UK Government lift a finger to take it out, despite the many concerns and reservations that were expressed?

Jim Murphy: My hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway (Mr. Brown) is right to raise this issue. The hon. Member for Moray heckles the UK Fisheries Minister from a sedentary position, and of course there is a need for further improvement of the common fisheries policy—no one denies that. The hon. Gentleman is disappointed that Scottish Executive Ministers are just part of a delegation, but that is, and should remain, the position as long as Scotland remains part of the United Kingdom. As someone who is a Unionist and who does not believe in the separation of Scotland from the rest of the United Kingdom, I can say that that is the correct approach.
	Amendment No. 124 was tabled by the hon. Member for Stone. It seeks to attack the principle that the EU should take into account social objectives when legislating, which is contained in paragraph 17 of article 2 of the Lisbon treaty's provisions on competences. What in that provision does he and, I assume, his Front-Bench team take such great offence to? It states that account must be taken of
	"the promotion of a high level of employment, the guarantee of adequate social protection, the fight against social exclusion, and a high level of education, training and protection of human health.".
	He and his Front-Bench team seek to remove that provision from the treaty. In opposing amendment No. 124, we make it absolutely clear that we want nothing to do with the agenda that would remove those guarantees of social protection for workers and citizens of our country.

William Cash: I am grateful to the Minister for giving me a few minutes to reply to some of those points. First, much of this discussion is based on the Lisbon agenda, which is a failed project that demonstrates that the European Union has aspirations, but does not work. I described these competences as an aggrandisement of powers, including not only an invasion of the legislative supremacy of this House, but an increase in the powers of the European Court of Justice. They are being pursued tenaciously, and in an iniquitous manner, against the background of the Government in many instances having reached the decision at the Convention that they did not want the powers in the first place. A complete contradiction lies at the heart of the Government's position. One of the most pernicious aspects of all this is the extension of the powers and competences of the ECJ without a corresponding new treaty to increase the competences of the European Union under article 308.
	Therefore I wish to press amendment No. 186, not amendment No. 82, to a Division. Amendment No. 186 deals with that pernicious extension and it was endorsed, I am glad to say, by my hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh (Mr. Francois), the shadow Minister for Europe, who has just made an excellent speech. On that basis, I beg to ask leave to withdraw amendment No. 82.
	 Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
	 It being three hours after the commencement of proceedings, the First Deputy Chairman of ways and means  put forthwith the Questions necessary to dispose of the Questions on Amendments selected for separate decision, pursuant to Order [28 January and this day].
	 Amendment proposed: No. 222, in page 1, line 12, after 'excluding', insert—
	'(i) Article 2, paragraph 12, new Article 2B TEC (TFEU), paragraph 1(d), relating to the conservation of marine biological resources under the common fisheries policy; and
	(ii) '.— [Angus Robertson.]

John Healey: I beg to move,
	That the draft Cheshire (Structural Changes) Order 2008, which was laid before this House on 31st January, be approved.
	Tonight we are considering the draft order to implement the proposal to establish two new unitary councils for Cheshire. The proposal was originally made to us by Chester city council, subsequently endorsed and enjoined by three other district councils—Ellesmere Port and Neston, Macclesfield and Vale Royal. This is not the Government's proposal; it is not the Government's prescription for local government arrangements in Cheshire. It has been made to us by democratically elected and accountable councils, and it has been drawn up by those councils, which have discussed these views in their areas. They believe that it will put in place for the people and the businesses of Cheshire the best form of governance for the future of the area.

John Healey: Let me be clear. My Department certainly proposed the process and invited councils in two-tier areas across England to submit proposals for unitary arrangements. The minority of areas and councils submitted proposals, and the minority of those proposals have got to the stage of our looking to implement them.
	My point is simply this, and I make it first to my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody): this process of putting in place unitary council arrangements is entirely different from the processes established by previous Governments. Those processes were centrally defined and the proposals came from the centre. In this instance, we have assessed what has been put to us. I have come to the House proposing to put this proposal into law because we believe that it and the arrangements offer a form of governance for the people, businesses and communities of Cheshire which will suit the future.

John Healey: Because we set out in this process to approach the matter in an entirely different way—to be prepared to entertain proposals that were drawn up by elected councils representing their area and put to us as a Government. The hon. Gentleman is right to say that in 2004, under this Government, there was a question of potentially reorganising local government in Cheshire as part of the consideration of the wider referendum question on an elected regional assembly for the north-west. It was in the mid-1990s, under the previous Government of his party, that Cheshire was subject to potential reorganisation under the Banham proposals. As hon. Members who represent parts of the county will know much better than I do, this is the third potential local government reorganisation in under 15 years. There comes a point when that continuing uncertainty starts to be a disadvantage, and there is a case for saying that it is important to make a decision and then allow those in the local areas to get on and try to implement it.

John Healey: The prospect of any change can be distracting, disruptive and unsettling. That is certainly the case for those who are intimately involved with, work for and serve on councils in the Cheshire area, which is one of the reasons why I am keen that this House and the other place come to a decision on the proposals. People will then know where they stand. If this House and the other place vote to support the move towards unitary arrangements, it will allow everyone involved—as they are already beginning to do, whatever their initial view of the proposal's merits—to begin to ensure that from 1 April 2009 we can put in place two effective unitary councils for the benefit of those in the area.

John Healey: My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich makes an important point and helps me to make the next observation. In my view, it was important, when we considered the financial case and whether the proposals were affordable, not simply to take the figures that the councils that backed specific proposals submitted to us. We therefore brought in, through the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy and the Institute of Public Finance, independent financial experts who gave me, as Minister, advice on the case.

John Healey: The figures and main conclusions of the independent assessment were set out—my hon. Friend just read them out. They led the independent experts to conclude that the transitional costs on a prudent basis would be higher and the savings would be lower than those in the proposal once the arrangements were in place. Nevertheless, the savings would be £16 million, which is at the higher end of the restructuring proposals that the House has considered and approved in five other areas. We concluded that the pay-back period would be well within five years—we calculated that it would be just over three and a half years.
	Let me make a general point about the requirement for a broad cross-section of support. We said at the outset that we were not looking for evidence that a specific proposal commanded majority support, and that we would not allow any group or interest to have a veto over a proposal. The essential judgment that we had to make was whether there was a sufficiently broad cross-section of support to give us confidence that, if we proceeded with the proposal, it had a reasonable chance of being implemented successfully. That was our approach.
	I should like to draw hon. Members' attention to the main, although not all, elements of the order. We prepared the order, as we prepared those for other areas, through detailed discussion, with agreement as far as possible and certainly with consultation with all the affected councils—those who proposed the two unitary authorities solution, those who opposed it and those who took no view on the competing proposals.
	The order provides that, from 1 April 2009, there will be a single tier of local government in Cheshire. Unlike the five other orders that the House has agreed, there is no continuing authority, but a wholly new start. The order provides for establishing two joint implementation committees, one for Cheshire, East, to be led by the current leader of Macclesfield, and one for Cheshire, West and Chester, to be led by the current leader of Vale Royal. They will serve before the elections to the respective shadow authorities, which we intend will happen this year. The order provides for elections in May on the basis of interim warding arrangements for those councils. It also provides for cancelling district council elections, which would otherwise happen in May 2008.
	I accept that the time scale for implementing the proposals by April 2009 is challenging. There are good grounds for believing that that is achievable, not least the strong leadership that local government in Cheshire is providing for the work on implementing the proposals. There is practical co-operation, even from those who opposed the proposals, so preparations are well under way. The nature of the support and involvement that we can offer from the centre is also important.
	Finally, the order sets out an approach to the transition that will be as effective as possible, minimise disruption to services in Cheshire, give a good deal to the service users, be fair and equitable to the council staff and, above all, help to lay the groundwork for a form of governance for the people, businesses and communities in Cheshire that will serve them well in the future. I commend the order to the House.

Andrew Miller: Will the hon. Gentleman accept from me that Ellesmere Port and Neston borough council's all-party policy has for a number of years been to move towards a unitary solution? The council's original preferred solution was to create three authorities, but it compromised on two. Would he accept that from me?

Bob Neill: Many people would say that if the consultation was genuine, it is surprising that there should have been no option to improve two-tier working. That is rather odd, since the Government have sought pathfinder bids to do exactly that in other contexts. If that was good and acceptable in parts of the east midlands, I do not see why it is unacceptable in the north-west.

Bob Neill: I would have thought that the hon. Lady would make my point. If there was such a divergence of opinion, it would have been better to ask the people to start with, rather than imposing the change through worthy bodies on committees.
	My point—we have gone through this many times before, but the principles do not change—is simply this. When we consider the large amount of risk, in terms of uncertainty and cost, that inevitably arises in any restructuring in local government—it is not too difficult to unpick the figures that have been quoted in support of the current proposals by citing the work of other academics, such as Professor Chisholm and others—it is not unreasonable to say: first, that the onus of proof should be on those who propose change; secondly, that the burden of proof should be high; thirdly, that it should be based on firm evidence; and fourthly, that that evidence should be judged against clear and objective criteria. I am sorry to say that the conclusion, on balance, that this proposal has a more reasonable chance than the other is scarcely the application of any form of evidence to reasonable criteria. This is a suck-it-and-see form of politics, and it is not fair on the people who live in Cheshire or in any of the other affected counties.
	The Government have not managed to make their case, which they have based entirely on one set of proposals. They have not explored the important alternative of improved two-tier working.

Gwyneth Dunwoody: I was astonished at the way in which the Minister introduced this order. Whichever way we look at it, the Department said in 2007 that it was going to look for reorganisation. It is important to understand what it was asking. It said of the bids for unitary status:
	"It is wholly at the discretion of a Council whether or not it responds to this invitation. The Government accepts that it is only in some areas that Local Government restructuring is widely seen as the way forward. It will be from Councils in such areas that proposals are made."
	The Department then went on to make it clear that it would take note of local views and expect to consult a vast cross-section of the people involved, and that it would certainly take account of those working in education and social services and in any other areas that would be directly affected by the order.
	When it became clear, to people's astonishment, that the council was actually suggesting a proposal that was not supported by the majority of Cheshire ratepayers, there was an enormous attempt to discover exactly what the council had meant in its letter which stated that it was "minded" to put forward this suggestion, and that it would be based on the criteria that had been discussed. The reality is that it was not based on anything of the sort.
	We must be quite clear that, in the discussion on the figures that were put forward for the authorities, there has been a constant shifting of the goalposts, and not just by the Department. A bid based on Chester has constantly changed. The savings have changed, the administration costs have changed and it is very clear that the information given to the Government was not strong enough to support their view—otherwise, they would have been quite prepared to support the request made under the Freedom of Information Act for a copy of the assessment and would not have needed to refuse it. If the report vindicates the decision further to change the financial envelope, why does the Department wish to conceal it? There must be a reason.
	We should make it quite clear that when the decision to opt for a unitary basis for the whole of the county of Cheshire was made, it was not done for something as simple as the status quo. A great deal of work went into making it clear that we were prepared to consider a county region, that we were aware of the economic and political costs and that we were very clear about Cheshire's ability to attract direct investment flows from all around it. We are all aware of Cheshire's close connections with Liverpool, Manchester, the Potteries and north Wales, which make it unique in its operation.
	What is now clear, however, is that no matter whether we look at the independent review of Local Government Futures, the assessments done on behalf of the county or the subsequent assessments by the Department itself, the impact of this reorganisation will be absolutely disastrous. The county will be divided into two, both unitaries will be faced with direct economic problems and they will both lose money.
	Under the current needs methodology, the report concluded that west Cheshire unitary would be entitled to £82.7 million of formula grant and east Cheshire £54.1 million; but the proposed two-unitary model, when uplifted to the present settlement figures, allocates only £76.4 million to the west and £60.4 million to the east. The local agreement deprives the west of £6.3 million of formula grant a year—2.5 per cent. of council tax—and the funding is effectively permanently lost in the form of a financial subsidy to the east because in three years' time, the national grant distribution formula will be applied to the two unitaries using their locally agreed allocation. It is totally unrealistic to assume that one authority will agree to provide a substantial financial subsidy to the other. In fact, it may prove to be unlawful and in breach of the authority's fiduciary duties to council tax payers.
	Although we looked closely into the economics, it is not just a matter of the amounts of money involved. Almost without exception, the education services wrote to Ministers making it very clear that, whether it be the teams built up to deal with special education or social services, they would all face very real difficulties with the reorganisation that was being pushed through over their heads. What happened? The Minister in the other place, Lord Adonis, wrote to them, saying effectively, "Oh well, we are very concerned about what you say, but don't worry, after you have reapplied for your own jobs you will have to work together". Well, that is brilliant, is it not? First, we will divide you up; then force you to go through an entire reorganisation; then we say, what is really important for the county is that you work together. Some people may not find that insulting; I find it absolutely bizarre.
	We want to know exactly how the Government intend to make up the shortfall in finances. We want to know exactly how they imagine that a carefully planned authority, which has just been given an excellent rating—a better rating than it had before—can be expected to tear itself in two and produce a level of change that will meet the needs of my constituents in any way.
	In reaching her decision, the Secretary of State took the view that a single unitary authority would not reflect the
	"economic reality that many consultees perceive splits Cheshire between East and West",
	although she was not able to produce the number of consultees or any evidence about them. The existence of the opposite view, however, was very plain—even on the No. 10 Downing street website, which today bore nearly 2,000 signatures defending Cheshire's status as a unitary whole.
	Cheshire is a powerful economy in its own right. It is independent of the surrounding city regions of Liverpool and Manchester, and it requires a strong and coherent strategic approach to development. There is a fundamental misinterpretation of the economic evidence suggesting a split economy in Cheshire, and the decision on the basis of east-west economic flows reveals a simplistic and partial understanding of the economy.
	On Monday the Minister published the results of his Department's stakeholder consultation, which had resulted in 906 responses. There were 27 responses from local government, 64 from town and parish councils, 67 from the public sector, 35 from the business sector and 35 from the voluntary and community sector, as well as 680 public responses. There were 200 further responses which the Department decided to discount.
	The Department's report describes overwhelming support for keeping Cheshire together. The county council's proposal was supported by a quarter of town and parish councils, with only a very small number supporting the alternative. Public sector respondents and all the schools were in favour of single unitary status, as were the majority of voluntary and community organisations, and the business community made it very clear that it did not want the change.
	I find it extraordinary that although it is clear that only the single-unitary proposal is capable of meeting the "broad cross-section of support" criterion, that fact is to be ignored and we are to be pushed into a "two unitaries" arrangement. The Department has been highly selective in its approach to evidence of stakeholder and public support, which suggests that Ministers were aware that many unitary proposals were unlikely to receive public endorsement. The Secretary of State was entirely wrong not to consult the public directly, especially as the invitation to submit proposals in October 2006 stated explicitly that the Department would undertake consultation before making decisions.
	The practical difficulties are such that problems are already being posed to library services for the elderly, to special educational needs teams, to the way in which we plan the development of education for the future, and to children's care services.

Daniel Rogerson: My remarks are to be directed at the issue of time scales, and with that in mind I shall try to keep them brief.
	My party is very supportive of the concept of unitary local government where it is appropriate for the area concerned. However, the process that gets us towards that is crucial, and there are a number of issues that we need to bear in mind. The time scales imposed on this particular process have restricted local debate so that consultation has been rudimentary. I welcome the fact that some of the proposals have been discussed for a long time prior to the process, but the time scales set out under the provisions have restricted proper formal consultation.
	In many of the bidding processes that have already been debated in the House, one authority has been advancing one case, while another has been advancing another, and they have tended to do so in a self-interested way. As time is constrained, the process has not allowed for a more sensible debate, and people have retreated into silos, which is unfortunate. That is a feature of how the process has been set up. Many of the polls, referendums and consultations that have been undertaken have been seen to be flawed and called into question because they have had to be carried out rapidly and there were limitations on what could be achieved.
	The short period available to compile bids may lead to having hostages to fortune later on that come back to haunt the people tasked with implementing the bids, when they come to do so. We have also heard that the time scale has influenced some authorities to react to the response of other authorities; for example, a county council might bid, and districts might feel that they have to react in a certain way. That is another feature of the time-scale constraints placed on the process.
	What will happen if the order is passed? In contrast with some other areas, including my own area of Cornwall, in Cheshire the proposal is for a shadow council to be elected, instead of having a period in which representatives of existing authorities come together to draw up how things will move forward. There are arguments for and against both those processes. Clearly, where officers are to be appointed, the shadow authority has the electoral mandate to be able to carry that out. However, with two very new authorities, the situation is different from that which pertains in other bid areas where existing authorities cover the area.

Andrew Miller: I shall be brief. I want to correct some inaccuracies. A number of hon. Members have said "in Cheshire". Cheshire is, of course, an historic county. As the hon. Member for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) will recall, its boundaries included Wirral, Stockport and so on. Those areas disappeared off from Cheshire some time ago. In the early 1990s, Halton and Warrington became unitary authorities. When the hon. Gentleman lived up there, Halton was half in Lancashire and half in Cheshire. The notion that this proposal is splitting Cheshire is fallacious, and we should put that on the record once and for all. Cheshire started to change geographically a considerable time ago.
	I have received a number of e-mails telling me that I am destroying 1,000 years of history—I am sure that other hon. Members have received similar correspondence. I have been around the political system for a long time. I was around in the 1974 local government reorganisation, when a substantial part of Cheshire was separated off—that was not quite 1,000 years ago—and in the subsequent reorganisation in the 1990s. This proposal does not split Cheshire; it splits the remaining part of Cheshire. For the purposes for which you and I consider counties, Mr. Deputy Speaker, the historic county remains, although Cheshire is a minor county in cricket.
	The second misconception is that the proposal splits the county council—it does not. It is about seven authorities becoming two. That is a matter of fact, and the efficiency gains come from it. The third point that I want to make—I mentioned this to the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill)—is that it has been the policy of Ellesmere Port and Neston borough council, on the basis of a three-party agreement, to support this proposal. I hope that Opposition Members will accept that that is said with absolute sincerity, because it is an all-party position.
	Why does the proposal make sense? It makes sense because economically Cheshire faces two different ways. The west of the county—my part of the county—is part of an economic unit generally called the Deeside hub. It is one of the fastest growing parts of the British economy. We have a little local difficulty with the significance of the Welsh boundary and indeed the Merseyside boundary, but they work, and the area works as an economic unit that transcends the local government boundaries. The reality is that that part of the economy faces into north Wales and into Merseyside. Indeed, when I dealing with the Vauxhall Motors case last year, presenting an argument for support from General Motors Europe, I discovered that more than 1,000 people working at Vauxhall travelled in from north Wales. That is a dynamic local economy.
	The relationships with Crewe and Nantwich are almost non-existent. The good folk of Crewe and Nantwich work in that area and towards the Potteries and Manchester. The economy faces two ways— [ Interruption. ] My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) has had her say— [ Interruption. ] I can be even ruder.
	There is a fundamental argument in favour of a split somewhere down the centre of the county. I would have preferred it to be slightly more to the west, but that would have been the three unitary solution that was dismissed at a much earlier stage by the county. First, we need to remember the history of the county—this is not about splitting into two, but about seven becoming two. Secondly, there is the powerful argument that the economy faces two ways, which is a sound argument in favour of the proposal. I ask the House to support the proposal.

Nicholas Winterton: First, I wish to thank the Minister for the courtesy that he extended to me during the consultation period. I am very grateful for that.
	This latest local government restructuring has been an extremely painful experience. It has set council against council and councillor against councillor. Some of us believe that it is a way for the Government to reduce the number of Conservative councils and of Conservative councillors, so that the Government can take over the Local Government Association, but I am sure that I must be wrong about that.
	The process has been painful. I believe that the Cheshire county council and the six borough and district councils should have embarked on a programme to improve the two-tier system. They should have learnt from and built on the experience of the pathfinder authorities, and they should have implemented the propositions in "Strong and Prosperous Communities", which was a Government document. The councils should have developed the devolution of real power and responsibilities to parish, town and community councils. Sadly, they did not do that in Cheshire.
	The hon. Member for Weaver Vale (Mr. Hall) is right to say that the councils broke ranks. As a result, when it came to the real consultation, instead of being able to negotiate an improved two-tier system of local government—which would have been overwhelmingly accepted in Cheshire—we were left with two options. One was for a single unitary authority, based on the Cheshire county council, and the other was for two unitary authorities—east Cheshire, and west Cheshire and Chester. The Minister and his colleagues decided that the two unitary proposal was their preferred solution to the problems of local government in Cheshire. On 18 December, the announcement was made that Cheshire would have two unitary authorities, based on the three councils in east Cheshire and the three councils in west Cheshire. I personally regret that, but that is the realpolitik.
	I sympathise with the passion with which the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) spoke. In many ways, I share her concern. At the end of the day, I supported the proposal for two unitary authorities because Macclesfield borough council was strongly in favour of it. When the third option of the status quo was removed, and the choice was between a single unitary authority and two unitary authorities, my borough council was strongly in favour of having two. I have to say to the hon. Lady, whose passion impressed me, that I felt obliged to support my council and the people of Macclesfield who—by a majority, if letters in the press and other representations are taken into account—supported the idea that Macclesfield should be part of the east Cheshire authority.
	I want to be brief to allow many of my colleagues to get in. I want to say, constructively, that the seven Cheshire local authorities—the six borough and district councils and the county council—have lost no time in establishing joint committees for east Cheshire and for west Cheshire and Chester, as the Minister said. They have also set up related joint implementation teams of officers. That shows a positive attitude. It builds on the preparatory work undertaken by the sponsoring authorities, and is in accordance with the provisions of the draft order that we are considering. The joint committees have met several times informally in advance of the making of the order and a joint liaison committee has also been set up to deal with overarching issues. We cannot always look back on such matters as much as I would personally wish to do so.
	The east and west Cheshire joint implementation teams have met weekly since the beginning of this year, with positive and dynamic input, particularly—this will surprise the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich— from senior county council managers, who are leading key areas of work, including work in people services, human resources and drafting the implementation plan. Specialists in key services operated by the county council and its partners support that work. In all the arrangements, all seven local authorities and their partners are actively and positively involved with major partners, signalling their desire to be more fully engaged. Good progress is being made.
	I regret that the restructuring orders are being introduced. Change is not required, but we were faced with two options. Instead of making representations to the Government that they would seek to co-operate to achieve a more efficient, improved two-tier system, the six district and borough councils and the county council in Cheshire did not work together. The major part of the county, the county council, broke ranks. As a result, we were faced with the two options. Of those two options, the one that is the subject of the order has my tacit support. I believe that localism in local Government is critical. People want to identify with their county councillors—or their councillors, as they will be in the future. That can be better achieved by having the two unitary authorities and a smaller structure, rather than a dramatically large council.
	I have every respect for the county council. I have the great honour of being a deputy lieutenant of the county and I want to see much of the tradition of the county retained. Although I deeply regret what is happening, the fact is that we are faced with a fait accompli. Of the two options, I went for the two unitary authorities.

Mike Hall: First, I thank the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) for the way in which he has put on the record where we are now in terms of the debate. When I campaigned for unitary local government in Warrington and Halton, Macclesfield should have had unitary status at the same time, and then we might well not have had this debate.
	I have been a strong supporter of unitary local government. It brings local government closer to the people, removes the confusion of the two-tier system and places large responsibilities on those authorities that take over. That is the way forward.
	I shall be honest with the House: like my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller), I originally favoured the three unitary authority approach for Cheshire. That was the agreed position of the six district councils in the county, but the Government said that it was not acceptable. The districts considered the matter again and, following an intervention from Conservative Front Benchers—and I make no criticism of them for that—five of the six districts said that they would support an enhanced two-tier arrangement.
	That was against their better instincts, as the districts wanted unitary local government, but they were told in no uncertain terms that they were to support enhanced two tier. The districts had been in agreement, but what broke the mould was the vote taken by the county council in support of a resolution that Cheshire should become a single unitary authority. It put a huge amount of money from council tax payers into the campaign, and that forced the districts to go back to the drawing board.
	The districts came up with the two unitary authority solution—that is, east and west Cheshire—that my hon. Friend the Minister set out earlier from the Dispatch Box. That is the point at which the campaign became difficult. Cheshire county council embraced the campaign for a single unitary authority, but it also began to do some serious scaremongering, saying that the Government were proposing to call the two unitary authorities "Manshire" and "Merseyshire".
	That was absolute nonsense, but the county council then claimed that it was campaigning to stop Cheshire being split up. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston said, the county had 15 local authorities in 1974. They were responsible for delivering local government in the traditional shire county of Cheshire, but all that has changed. The county council has now proposed abolishing itself and the six other local authorities to create two unitary authorities, but its premise was that that would save the county council. That incorrect assertion has been repeated again this evening.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) has taken three positions on this proposal. She was in favour of the status quo, then of enhanced two tier, and then of a single unitary county council. I might not disagree if the option before us was enhanced two tier, and certainly not if the proposal was for three unitary councils to cover the area covered by the county council and the six districts. However, I agree with the hon. Member for Macclesfield, for whom I have huge respect, in that I do not want a single unitary authority for the whole area covered by the county council and the six districts.
	I turn now to the important question of affordability. The position adopted by the city of Chester was put forward in a report that was backed up by independent accountants. It was that the pay-back period for the two unitary authority solution for Cheshire would be four years, and that money—£100 for each council tax payer affected—would be available to equalise council tax. That is a very important matter, but the report also stated that money would be made available for new services, if the two unitary authorities wanted to spend it. I think that those are fundamental factors in favour of the reorganisation that we are discussing.
	I appreciate that other hon. Members wish to speak in this short debate, so I shall end with two final points. The first has to do with how we take the matter forward. An important debate is under way, but Cheshire county council and the six districts have got together and accepted what the Government are proposing. They have not mounted any legal challenge to the order that is before the House: instead, they have got down to working out how to deliver two unitary authorities in the county, and they are doing a fantastic job.
	I want to commend two individuals for the work that they have done. It is not often that civil servants get the recognition that they deserve, but the two proposed chief executives for the unitary authorities in east and west Cheshire have done a fantastic job in taking the agenda forward, and they have not been held back by the debates that have gone on in some parts of the House today. Mrs. Anne Bingham-Holmes, the chief executive of Vale Royal borough council, is a first-class chief executive. She works for a Conservative local authority that is fully behind the proposals that we are debating, and I commend her. Viv Horton, the chief executive of Macclesfield borough council—the council that my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield represents—is also a first-class chief executive. She is leading the way for that authority to make east Cheshire a unitary authority. Now is not the time to emphasise our divisions; we should be saying, "This is what we'll do, and what is in the best interests of everybody whom we represent." We should take that agenda forward in a positive way.

George Osborne: I shall keep my remarks brief because two of my Conservative colleagues and the hon. Member for City of Chester (Christine Russell) want to speak. I do not disagree with much of what was said by the hon. Member for Weaver Vale (Mr. Hall), who has a neighbouring constituency to mine. We certainly want the east and west authorities to work, if the plans for them go ahead. We want the transition to be as smooth as possible, and we want costs to be kept to a minimum. It is alarming that since the process began, the Government's estimates of the cost have nearly doubled, and the estimate of the savings has nearly halved. I join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to the two chief executives that I deal with as a constituency MP, Anne Bingham-Holmes and Vivienne Horton. I wish them well in the task ahead.
	The hon. Gentleman is right that when the members of Cheshire county council voted on the issue, it began the process that led to tonight's debate. However, we have an opportunity to stop the process tonight—or rather tomorrow, when we vote using the pink slips. We could stop a process that many people in the county, and many Members present who represent the county, believe is wrong, unwarranted, undemocratic and unsupported by the facts. When the original process began, following the White Paper and the invitation to the councils to submit a bid, the Government said that they wanted any bids for unitary status to command broad support. Indeed, I think that the Minister said something similar to that in his opening remarks.
	We are about to proceed with a proposal that was initially supported by only one council group on one district council in one part of the county. That council group lost its position as the leadership group on that council in subsequent local elections. It is true that different district councils—faced with the fait accompli, as my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) put it, of Cheshire county council's decision—then worked on their own proposals for two or three unitary authorities in Cheshire, but let us remember that the proposal that we are being asked to support tonight was originally supported by only one council group on one district council.

George Osborne: As I understand it, a Conservative group on Chester city council made different proposals from those that the previous leadership—[Hon. Members: "No."] Well, we could debate the issue at greater length if we had the time, but sadly we do not, because of the timetabling.
	I return to the point that the proposal was not originally supported by a large number of councils in Cheshire. On every attempt to test public opinion in Cheshire, it has not been supported by the public; that applies to the referendum held in Crewe and Nantwich and the opinion survey carried out in the county. The Government have refused to hold a referendum, even though when we discussed local government reorganisation just four years ago there was a proposal for a referendum, not just on regional government, but on the local government arrangements in Cheshire.
	The House is left to decide whether to impose on the people of Cheshire a form of local government that has not received any public support. We can make many arguments for and against the proposed changes, but striking warnings have been made by, among others, members of the education system in Cheshire—teachers, head teachers and governors. The concern of the fire authority is striking, and it is striking that the majority of Members of Parliament representing Cheshire oppose the local government reorganisation. We can make all these points, but the central point is surely this: in the end, democratic arrangements and local government structures should be based on identities that people have in their hearts, not in the minds of Whitehall Departments.
	The current system is broadly supported by local people. There is the identity of Cheshire. Although bits have been chopped off over the past 30 years, as the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller) pointed out, the historic heart of the county remains and there is a county council based on that. Then there are local arrangements, which in my case mean that constituents can look to Macclesfield or Vale Royal borough council. We are about to throw away these arrangements in pursuit of a proposal that does not command public support. That is not the way to conduct our business in a democratic system.
	Of course we will try to make the arrangements work if they are voted through tomorrow, and we will do everything we can to ensure that disruption for local people is kept to a minimum, but in the deferred Division that will come later today, we have an opportunity to stop the proposal in its tracks and get on with delivering services such as education, social services and housing, which people want us to be talking about both in Cheshire and in the House of Commons.

Christine Russell: In view of the time, I shall make a few quick points that have not been made by colleagues. I hope I have clarified the position regarding the political stance in Chester. When the bid was put in, all three political parties backed it. The party now in charge of the town hall has not overturned that resolution.
	The City of Chester has a proud history that dates back 2,000 years. Up to 1974 the borough council—the city—ran all its public services. As hon. Members have said, there was huge disappointment in the city in 1995, when the previous Government, after consulting on local government reorganisation, decided to award Warrington and Halton boroughs unitary status, but left the rest of Cheshire as two tier. I have been involved in politics in Chester since 1980 and I can assure the House that the aspiration of the people whom I represent and have always represented is for local government to be local in Chester.
	The proposals in the order before us complement the current delivery pattern for local services. The Western Cheshire primary care trust entirely supports the policies because its boundaries mirror the boundaries of the proposed City of Chester and West Cheshire new unitary authority. Cheshire constabulary has three command units. One covers Halton and Warrington, one covers west Cheshire and one covers east Cheshire. The fire service is organised on similar lines. My constituents and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller) and the hon. Member for Eddisbury (Mr. O'Brien) share most of the same local health services. We have a joint magistrates Bench. So the delivery of all those services replicates the proposal before us.
	I emphasise how confusing the present system is. I say that from the perspective of the Member of Parliament for City of Chester, where there is a visible landmark, the town hall. County hall is only half a mile away, but is invisible to most people. The assumption is that the town hall delivers the services. It is visible and it sends out the council tax bills. But the reality is that 80 per cent. of local service funding comes from the county council.
	The present two-tier system is totally confusing, and I could give many examples of that. People are confused by the fact that the city council collects their rubbish while the county council is responsible for waste disposal, and the city council is responsible for granting planning permissions while the county council is the transport authority. That does not make for good local government, and one good example of that is that four years ago the Government awarded Cheshire county council £4.8 million to provide an extra care facility for elderly frail people, but after four years, those two authorities still have not got their act together. I am led to believe that a site has finally been identified, but the present two-tier system does not work. There is no joined-up working.
	As other hon. Members have said, the joint implementation teams are already working well together. I hope that all hon. Members recognise that this is a time of anxiety for the thousands of employees who work for the seven local authorities across Cheshire. It has been suggested that we should defer the decision because there has been insufficient consultation, but I can assure the House that people in Chester have been talking about local government reorganisation ever since the last round ended in 1995.

Stephen O'Brien: I am downcast and very disappointed.
	It is clear that there was no demand for this measure. There has been no identification of anything that has been so bad that it needs to be changed and fixed. Two-tier working has improved over the years and it could have been improved further, according to objective tests the delivery of services was excellent all round, and education and social services were excellent, both of which are now at risk because of the confusion of this rammed-through and imposed solution.

Stephen O'Brien: I will not give way, given the length of time for which the hon. Gentleman spoke. However, he put his finger on one problem, which was that once anybody admitted that there had to be a unitary approach, not least when the county council voted, the difficulty of maintaining the consistency of the argument for an improved two-tier system was lost. It was a great shame that many people were tempted to support that and fell for the trap that was laid for them by a Labour party, politically driven agenda, which was to halve the number of Conservative activists through councillors in the county, and to ensure that there was a real problem in identifying where there would any kind of local accountability as part of the great aftermath of having lost any ability to impose a regionally elected solution on Cheshire.
	This is all part of a political agenda where inevitably no one ever votes for lower pay, lower pay-offs and lower pensions. This will all cost a lot more than the Government are pretending it will. Therefore, when this happens and the council tax is under pressure, it does not matter who is in charge—I would like to predict that it will be the Conservatives—it will be the Government's fault, and we will be able to say that with truth, because it is the Government who have engineered this expensive, unnecessary solution. We should reject it and take this last opportunity to stand up for our constituents and not fall for this terrible trap set by the Government, who do not like the idea of good, local democracy operating in Cheshire.

John Healey: With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I should like to reply. Tonight we have heard views from all sides, put with passion, reason and concern in varying combinations depending on the contribution. I should like to correct some significant inaccuracies and try to deal with some important concerns that have come up. The invitation to councils across England was made in October 2006. It asked for both unitary proposals and proposals for pathfinders to improve two-tier arrangements. We received five proposals for improving two-tier working, none from Cheshire.
	I should say that we have not disclosed the detail of the independent financial assessment; that was conducted as advice to Ministers and was therefore covered by section 35 as an exemption from freedom of information requirements. However, I have made clear the principal conclusions of the assessment. In the view of the independent experts, the transition costs were certainly greater than those in respect of the proposing authorities, at £25 million. However, the payback comes within just over three and a half years and the annual savings are more than £16 million a year.
	Opinion is divided about support, as we have seen tonight. However, there is a cross-section of support, which gives us confidence that if we go ahead we can make a go of the two unitary authorities. Not only the three district councils back the two-unitary solution—important businesses in the region, such as AstraZeneca and the Cheshire building society also do, and six of the 20 parishes that expressed a view do. The chief constable is neutral but marginally in favour of the two-unitary option, essentially because it would be more coterminous with his basic command units. One of the advantages is better strategic leadership; that is why East Cheshire NHS Trust and West Cheshire primary care trust also support the proposal, as does the West Cheshire college, the Highways Agency and Age Concern East Cheshire.
	Concerns have been expressed by the Merits Committee, which were reflected in a couple of contributions, about the time scale and about whether we should be allowing more time to prepare for the change. The implementation teams in east and west Cheshire are up and running, however, as the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Sir Nicholas Winterton) and my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christine Russell) made clear. Officers from all the councils are now working together and have been doing so for some time, with the result that much of the preparatory work is already well advanced. Of particular importance is the increasing involvement evident in Crewe and Nantwich and in Congleton, despite local opposition to the proposal, and the greater involvement of Cheshire county council, especially in terms of some important areas of work led by its senior officers.
	When one adds to that the arrangements for support from the centre, the implementation plans set out in the order, the regular meetings with national Government officials, the detailed involvement from the Government office for the north-west, and the fact that Humberside and Avon represent precedents, from back in 1995, for similar reorganisations on a similar time scale being undertaken effectively, we are given the confidence to believe that this proposed reorganisation can and will be done on a time scale to allow the new authorities to be up and running on 1 April 2007. I recognise that the time scales are tight, but they have been set in response to the local authorities, which have all urged us to make the decision and get on with it. The county council has recognised that, which is why it has decided to withdraw its legal proceedings against the Secretary of State. The county council leader, Paul Findlow—I pay tribute to him—has committed to work with district council colleagues, and the leader of the Labour group, Derek Bateman, has also thrown his weight behind the criticism of those who look to try to block the proposal.
	The worst outcome would be if the uncertainty that Cheshire has faced arising from previous reorganisation proposals were to continue because no decision was backed tonight in this place and, later in the week, in the other House. We have created this chance for new flagship local authorities to set a new standard for local government—we expect no less.
	 Question put:—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With the leave of the House, I shall put motions 7 and 8 together.
	 Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(6) (Standing Committees on Delegated Legislation),

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 119(9) (European Standing Committees),

Joan Ryan: Despite the lateness of the hour, I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on the important issue of community supplementary schools. Those schools, with roots in the African-Caribbean community's pioneering work in the 1970s, aim to enhance the educational opportunities of young people through the provision of out-of-school-hours educational initiatives. They supplement mainstream education through a programme that emphasises culture alongside the skills required to achieve academically.
	I know that Lord Adonis has taken a keen interest in this issue, and I thank him for all the time and attention that he has dedicated so far to addressing and improving the status of supplementary schools. I also thank Paul Morrish from ContinYou, one of UK's leading community learning organisations and host of the National Resource Centre for Supplementary Education—the NRC—and the supplementary school leaders in my constituency, particularly the Turkish supplementary schools consortium, which has worked tirelessly to build, run and grow these facilities for young people in Enfield.
	I am pleased that the issue of supplementary schools is moving further up the political agenda and into the education limelight. Recently, representatives of some of London's 23 Turkish and Kurdish supplementary schools met Lord Adonis to discuss the pressing issues facing this specific sector of the supplementary schools movement. That was a significant step towards embedding support for supplementary schools. I refer to Turkish supplementary schools because they are the predominant form of such school in my constituency, but there are supplementary schools in a range of communities throughout the country, such as Greek Cypriot, Jewish, Bangladeshi, and Muslim schools, and many others, including the Afro-Caribbean schools that I mentioned, which were pioneers in the 1970s.
	One of the ideas that arose from the meeting that the consortium held with the Minister was the suggestion of a senior champion to liaise between the Department for Children, Schools and Families, other Departments and others in the sector, including the national resource centre, to make progress in this area. I strongly welcome such a role and ask the Minister to commit to that extremely helpful idea. I hope that the Government will continue to work closely with and to support the National Resource Centre, which does excellent work in this field.
	An estimated 5,000 supplementary schools are operating in England. They demonstrate a significant commitment from ethnic minority communities to improve the academic attainment of minority ethnic pupils through the expression and fostering of cultural qualities. They play a fundamental role in facilitating mainstream education, cultural expression and community cohesion while highlighting the considerable efforts and costs burdening parents, teachers, volunteers and community groups throughout the UK. Despite that, short-term funding has prohibited long-term investment in staffing, resources and the development of partnerships. Some supplementary schools are large and well resourced, but the majority are small, cash-poor projects, reliant on the altruism of local parents, businesses and community groups. The problems and frustrations that they encounter will be familiar to anyone involved in community development and informal education: they lack funding and sometimes teaching resources, their teachers are often untrained, and they can struggle to find premises.
	Funding for supplementary schools is essential if they are to engage as genuine partners, develop the quality of their provision and engage in joint activities with schools. At their best, supplementary schools and mainstream schools link together to contribute to the integration and attainment of children; where that is taking place in a genuine partnership, the impact is demonstrable and impressive.
	The Government are committed to a fair, meritocratic education system that requires every pupil to be valued equally, but which also recognises that not every child should be taught in the same way. Supplementary schools can help to access and unlock the hidden potential of students whose individual intellectual potential has been reduced by a culturally uniform approach to learning. Government-led initiatives such as the ethnic minority achievement grant represent positive action from within the mainstream system to target the underachievement of certain ethnic groups. I feel that it is important to stress that significant progress has already been made.
	However, it is essential that children have an education and a knowledge base that is right for them as individuals. There is evidence to suggest that a one-size-fits-all mode of learning has, in part, marginalised ethnic minority children within the mainstream education system, which has in turn led to significant underachievement. Indeed, one of the key messages of "Diversity and Citizenship in the Curriculum", the 2007 curriculum review led by Sir Keith Ajegbo, was the centrality of a more flexible, diverse and tailored approach to teaching.
	In 2006, Ofsted found that
	"the diversity of national, regional, religious and ethnic identities in the United Kingdom and the need for mutual respect and understanding"
	in key stage 3 and
	"their origins and implications"
	in key stage 4 were
	"only rarely deconstructed to explore in any detail what this implies".
	Such views highlight the difficulties involved in redesigning the curriculum to allow for a greater educational diversity for all children, of all ethnic origins.
	However, Britain's supplementary sector represents an existing educational framework that has the unique capacity to cultivate and encourage individuals' cultural and lingual expression. Supplementary schools can engage young people effectively and help to translate elements of the mainstream curriculum into a culturally embedded context.
	I believe that such projects are vital to the integration of minority ethnic pupils in their respective communities, inside and outside school gates. Following the Government's drive to promote a policy of community cohesion, I am convinced that a great deal can be achieved by celebrating, recognising and encouraging the extraordinary resource that so many of our minority communities offer. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to explore ways in which guidance on community cohesion might best draw attention to the supplementary school sector.
	Of course, supplementary schools offer many other benefits to children and communities. They have traditionally worked closely with parents, local community groups and businesses. The supplementary sector generally boasts far more active parental involvement, which has been recognised as having a profound effect on children's attainment.
	Considerable qualitative and quantitative evidence suggests that students who attend supplementary school have markedly improved examination results across the core mainstream subjects of English, mathematics and science, in addition to their native language.
	A Bristol project that brought supplementary and mainstream schools together as part of a wider project, called the "Mainstreaming Supplementary School Support Project", boasted a 13 per cent. increase in those achieving five A* to C grades at GCSE against predicted grades, and a 39 per cent. increase in those achieving any A* to C grades. For some communities, the figures were even higher. Indeed, the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority suggests that local authorities and mainstream and supplementary schools should recognise the mutual benefits of collaboration between the sectors and formalise the links between them.
	The Government could do more to encourage mainstream schools to take advantage of those benefits, especially by supporting supplementary education through the successful extended schools programme. Given the amount of investment being made, surely some capacity must exist in local authorities and schools to engage with and support their local supplementary schools.
	The challenges of collaboration are illustrated in my constituency of Enfield, North, where it is clear that those benefits are not being realised as fully as they could be. Enfield Turkish school is an evening and weekend supplementary initiative hosted at Albany school in Enfield. It has proved a huge success in my constituency. Over the past three years, I have engaged with and worked with the chairman of the school, Suleyman Soydag, the deputy chair, Alp Ermiya, and teachers in the supplementary school and in the mainstream school that hosts them.
	Four hundred and five pupils attend Enfield Turkish school, of whom 265 attend Turkish language and cultural classes, 60 take GCSE classes and 80 adults attend English language classes. Teachers at Enfield Turkish school are highly qualified and some also teach at Albany school during the conventional school day. The standard of educational provision is outstanding, as is reflected in the GCSE results.
	Turkish school students who sat GCSE examinations in the Turkish language in 2005 achieved an average B grade result, with 95 per cent. achieving grades A* to C and 71.4 per cent. achieving either an A or A* grade. Enfield supplementary school is run over the course of a 38-week year, using two school halls and 14 classrooms every Sunday morning.
	The costs of renting the hall, the classrooms, the use of PCs, printing materials and additional hours for the school caretaker amount to £16,000 per annum. The chairman of the Turkish supplementary school, Suleyman Soydag explains that the money is raised through donations from local businesses, fundraising functions, a small grant from the local authority for accommodation or donations from the parents of attendees through a fees-based system. If the school let the classrooms and hall space at the standard rate, it would make £22,800. However, Albany school has created a special dispensation rate, letting the room and hall space at approximately 40 per cent. of the standard rate. The school also contributes £3,000 to the Turkish school. If we take all the costs into account, we see that Albany secondary school makes an annual loss of £2,899 on letting to the Turkish school.
	The money, effort and enthusiasm invested in Enfield Turkish school and similarly run supplementary projects throughout the country reflect untold academic and social benefits. Without the generous investment from Albany school, Enfield Turkish school could not afford the accommodation for its 405 students. Despite the additional investment that Albany school makes, I have witnessed the reality of the annual ritualistic struggle that Enfield Turkish school faces in maintaining its existing services. It is not that the parents do not want to continue to raise the money; rather, they want to be able to put a substantial amount of that money into the teachers and into the resources in the classroom.
	It is clear that further investment is needed. Supplementary schools have grown in number and in quality, owing to the widespread enthusiasm and confidence that communities have in the supplementary sector. As I have said, there are 5,000 projects nationally. Further investment is needed to secure a set of national standards and a quality framework to optimise the clear benefits of such schools, but that must be done in such a way as not to penalise those cash-poor voluntary run organisations.
	I end by thanking the Minister once again for his work on the issue and by asking him to continue to look into how we can better support the supplementary school sector, particularly in relation to the costs of the premises, support through the extended schools programme and integration into broader strategies such as community cohesion. I hope that a more codified set of guidelines can be developed to ensure that supplementary school projects are, at the very least, organised and run at cost.
	Ultimately, I believe that supplementary schools should have the use of school buildings for free. I know that the matter is devolved to local authorities, which already have the power to remove many charges, but they are unlikely to do so without pressure from the Government. I ask the Minister seriously to consider the contribution of supplementary schools and to think about what I have said about costs. I do not expect him to give me a commitment this evening, but I know that the Department values supplementary schools.

Joan Ryan: I would like to say that that is very welcome news. Although I hope that the Minister will continue to reflect on some of the other issues I have raised tonight, I would not want to be churlish, so I say again that he has announced very welcome news.